Search

Social-ecological networks (SENs) represent the complex relationships between ecological and social systems and are a useful tool for analyzing and managing ecosystem services. However, mainstreaming the application of SENs in ecosystem service research has been hindered by a lack of clarity about how to match research questions to ecosystem service conceptualizations in SEN (i.e., as nodes, links, attributes, or emergent properties). Building from different disciplines, we propose a typology to represent ecosystem service in SENs and identify opportunities and challenges of using SENs in ecosystem service research. Our typology provides guidance for this growing field to improve research design and increase the breadth of questions that can be addressed with SEN to understand human-nature interdependencies in a changing world.

Nearly a billion people depend on tropical seascapes. The need to ensure sustainable use of these vital areas is recognised, as one of 17 policy commitments made by world leaders, in Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 14 (‘Life below Water’) of the United Nations. SDG 14 seeks to secure marine sustainability by 2030. In a time of increasing social-ecological unpredictability and risk, scientists and policymakers working towards SDG 14 in the Asia–Pacific region need to know: (1) How are seascapes changing? (2) What can global society do about these changes? and (3) How can science and society together achieve sustainable seascape futures? Through a horizon scan, we identified nine emerging research priorities that clarify potential research contributions to marine sustainability in locations with high coral reef abundance. They include research on seascape geological and biological evolution and adaptation; elucidating drivers and mechanisms of change; understanding how seascape functions and services are produced, and how people depend on them; costs, benefits, and trade-offs to people in changing seascapes; improving seascape technologies and practices; learning to govern and manage seascapes for all; sustainable use, justice, and human well-being; bridging communities and epistemologies for innovative, equitable, and scale-crossing solutions; and informing resilient seascape futures through modelling and synthesis. Researchers can contribute to the sustainability of tropical seascapes by co-developing transdisciplinary understandings of people and ecosystems, emphasising the importance of equity and justice, and improving knowledge of key cross-scale and cross-level processes, feedbacks, and thresholds.

Environmentally focused social network analysis (Env. SNA) has increasingly benefited from engagement, which refers to the process of incorporating the individuals, organizations, actors, stakeholders or other study participants into the research process. Research about engagement in the wider field of environmental management shows that successful engagement often requires significant planning and exchange among researchers and stakeholders. While there is no one size fits all approach, several important guiding principles have been established. To date, this engagement literature has not focused specifically on SNA, even though several examples of engaged SNA exist in the literature and point to some specific challenges to engagement when working with relational data. Drawing upon data from a survey of researchers who have incorporated engagement into Env. SNA, we focus specifically on the goals, scope, effectiveness, benefits and challenges of doing engaged Env. SNA research. We additionally highlight four case studies and demonstrate that researchers and participants find engagement to be a valuable experience with benefits in the researchers’ understanding of the context and meaning of their findings. Finally, we provide recommendations to scholars looking to embark on engaged Env. SNA research.

To cope effectively with the impacts of climate change, people will need to change existing practices or behaviours within existing social-ecological systems (adaptation) or enact more fundamental changes that can alter dominant social-ecological relationships and create new systems or futures (transformation). Here we use multilevel network modelling to examine how different domains of adaptive capacity-assets, flexibility, organization, learning, socio-cognitive constructs and agency-are related to adaptive and transformative actions. We find evidence consistent with an influence process in which aspects of social organization (exposure to others in social networks) encourage both adaptive and transformative actions among Papua New Guinean islanders experiencing climate change impacts. Adaptive and transformative actions are also related to social-ecological network structures between people and ecological resources that enable learning and the internalization of ecological feedbacks. Agency is also key, yet we show that while perceived power may encourage adaptations, it may discourage more transformative actions. Multilevel network modelling shows that social network exposure promotes both adaptive and transformative responses to climate change among Papua New Guinean islanders. Different social-ecological network structures are associated with adaptation versus transformation.

Coral reefs are increasingly affected by climate-induced disturbances that are magnified by increasing ocean temperatures. Loss of coral reefs strongly affects people whose livelihoods and wellbeing depend on the ecosystem services reefs provide. Yet the effects of coral loss and the capacity of people and businesses to adapt to it are poorly understood, particularly in the private sector. To address this gap, we surveyed about half (57 of 109) of Australian reef tourism operators to understand how they were affected by and responded to severe impacts from bleaching and cyclones. Reef restoration and spatial diversification were the primary responses to severe bleaching impacts, while for cyclone-impacts coping measures and product diversification were more important. Restoration responses were strongly linked to the severity of impacts. Our findings provide empirical support for the importance of response diversity, spatial heterogeneity, and learning for social-ecological resilience.

Extreme climatic events trigger changes in ecosystems with potential negative impacts for people. These events may provide an opportunity for environmental managers and decision-makers to improve the governance of social-ecological systems, however there is conflicting evidence regarding whether these actors are indeed able to change governance after extreme climatic events. In addition, the majority of research to date has focused on changes in specific policies or organizations after crises. A broader investigation of governance actors' activities is needed to more fully understand whether or not crises trigger change. Here we demonstrate the use of a social network analysis of management and decision-making forums (e.g. meetings, partnerships) to reveal the effects of an extreme climatic event on governance of the Great Barrier Reef over an eight-year period. To assess potential shifts in action, we examine the topics of forums and the relative participation and influence of diverse governance actors before, during, and after two back-to-back mass coral bleaching events in 2016 and 2017. Our analysis reveals that there is little change in the topics that receive attention, and in the relative participation and influence of different actor groups in the region. Our research demonstrates that network analysis of forums is useful for analyzing whether or not actors' activities and priorities evolve over time. Our results provide empirical evidence that governance actors struggle to leverage extreme climate events as windows of opportunity and further research is needed to identify alternative opportunities to improve governance.

Climate change is expected to have increasing impacts on marine ecosystems which will threaten the livelihoods and wellbeing of millions of people. Drawing on social-ecological network and sociodemographic data collected via face-to-face interviews with 404 small-scale commercial fishers from 9 Galician communities (Spain), we empirically examine the adaptation pathways that fishers follow when they face hypothetical impacts on their fishery resources and test the role of five social-ecological network structures on fisher’s stated intended responses to such scenarios. Our results show that fishers generally intend to follow a ‘remain—adapt—transform—exit (the fishery)’ pathway when faced with increasing climate impacts. Next, we demonstrate that trust-based bonding ties and ties to informal leaders are associated with a ‘business-as-usual’ strategy. In contrast, communicative bonding ties are associated with adaptive responses, while communicative bridging ties are associated with transformative and exit strategies. Our findings provide key empirical insight that broaden our understanding of the intricate relationship between social networks and adaptive behaviour relevant to social-ecological systems worldwide. Xunta de Galicia Australian Research Council | Ref. DE190101583

Resilience is generally considered the capacity to tolerate, absorb, cope with, and adjust to changing social or environmental conditions while retaining key elements of structure, function, and identity. The social dimensions of resilience are vital to understanding the impacts of environmental changes, such as climate change, on social-ecological systems. In this Primer, we introduce key social factors that provide resilience in linked social-ecological systems, including (1) assets, (2) flexibility, (3) social organization, (4) learning, (5) socio-cognitive constructs, and (6) agency. Emerging frontiers of resilience include applying social-ecological network approaches, investigating power relations, and exploring how transformative versus adaptive changes can promote resilience. A further understanding of the social dimensions of social-ecological systems can provide valuable information on how these systems may respond to change and equip us with the knowledge to support or build resilience in vulnerable systems.

Achieving effective, sustainable environmental governance requires a better understanding of the causes and consequences of the complex patterns of interdependencies connecting people and ecosystems within and across scales. Network approaches for conceptualizing and analyzing these interdependencies offer one promising solution. Here, we present two advances we argue are needed to further this area of research: (i) a typology of causal assumptions explicating the causal aims of any given network-centric study of social-ecological interdependencies; (ii) unifying research design considerations that facilitate conceptualizing exactly what is interdependent, through what types of relationships, and in relation to what kinds of environmental problems. The latter builds on the appreciation that many environmental problems draw from a set of core challenges that re-occur across contexts. We demonstrate how these advances combine into a comparative heuristic that facilitates leveraging case-specific findings of social-ecological interdependencies to generalizable, yet context-sensitive, theories based on explicit assumptions of causal relationships.

Policies to conserve sharks have generally struggled to gain broad public support. Ecotourism programs have been suggested as a way to promote support for conservation by increasing participants’ knowledge of ecology, fostering positive environmental attitudes, and driving increases in conservation behaviour. Yet the evidence is mixed, and some argue that its effectiveness is constrained by the “ceiling effect”, i.e., people attracted to ecotourism programs are already environmentally minded, thus their participation does not result in meaningful conservation gains. Surveys of 547 tour participants in a cage free shark diving ecotourism program and 488 members of the general public were conducted in Hawaii to test whether the program resulted in conservation benefits or whether it was constrained by the ceiling effect. The results show evidence of the ceiling effect, suggesting that the program is attracting more environmentally minded participants. Despite this, tour participants reported a significant increase in knowledge regarding the ecological role of sharks and improved attitudes towards sharks after the tour compared to before. Critically, once responses from tour participants and the general public were pooled and previous engagement in conservation was controlled for, participation in the tour still had a significant positive effect on intentions to engage in shark conservation in the future, suggesting that the program does result in meaningful conservation gains. The usefulness of the information provided on the tour in addition to participants’ age, gender, and satisfaction with the tour all played a role in determining its effectiveness as a conservation strategy.

Poaching renders many of the world’s marine protected areas ineffective. Because enforcement capacity is often limited, managers are attempting to bolster compliance by engaging the latent surveillance potential of fishers. However, little is known about how fishers respond when they witness poaching. Here, we surveyed 2,111 fishers living adjacent to 55 marine protected areas in seven countries and found that 48% had previously observed poaching. We found that the most common response was inaction, with the primary reasons being: (1) conflict avoidance; (2) a sense that it was not their responsibility or jurisdiction; and (3) the perception that poaching was a survival strategy. We also quantified how institutional design elements or conditions were related to how fishers responded to poaching, and highlight ways in which fishers can be engaged while mitigating risks. These include emphasizing how poaching personally affects each fisher, promoting stewardship and norms of personal responsibility and poverty alleviation to reduce the need for fishers to poach for survival. Poaching undermines the effectiveness of marine protected areas, where enforcement capacity is limited. In this study, fishers adjacent to MPAs were surveyed, and it was found that about half had observed poaching, but that most do not react so as to avoid conflict, or because they feel that this is either not their responsibility or that poaching is a survival strategy.

The natural environment plays an integral role in the culture of all people. Although the cultural services provided by ecosystems are often acknowledged, these abstract qualities are difficult to capture and are rarely incorporated into environmental strategic planning. We propose an approach for decision makers to weigh different cultural values across a range of stakeholder groups. We assessed the importance of the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) to the lifestyle, sense of place, pride, identity, and well-being of 8300 people across multiple cultural groups, as well as each of these groups' belief in the aesthetic, scientific, and biodiversity-based value of the GBR. The surveyed population included indigenous and non-indigenous local residents, Australians (non-local), international and domestic tourists, tourism operators, and commercial fishers. We discuss how some groups grant similar levels of importance to some values and how other groups differ in their attachment to certain values. All of the groups possessed the selected cultural values to some extent, suggesting that these values matter, and could be leveraged to secure the future of iconic ecosystems such as the GBR.

To minimize the impacts of climate change on human wellbeing, governments, development agencies, and civil society organizations have made substantial investments in improving people's capacity to adapt to change. Yet to date, these investments have tended to focus on a very narrow understanding of adaptive capacity. Here, we propose an approach to build adaptive capacity across five domains: the assets that people can draw upon in times of need; the flexibility to change strategies; the ability to organize and act collectively; learning to recognize and respond to change; and the agency to determine whether to change or not.

Identifying the right stakeholders to engage with is fundamental to ensuring conservation information and initiatives diffuse through target populations. Yet this process can be challenging, particularly as practitioners and policy makers grapple with different conservation objectives and a diverse landscape of relevant stakeholders. Here we draw on social network theory and methods to develop guidelines for selecting ‘key players’ better positioned to successfully implement four distinct conservation objectives: (1) rapid diffusion of conservation information, (2) diffusion between disconnected groups, (3) rapid diffusion of complex knowledge or initiatives, or (4) widespread diffusion of conservation information or complex initiatives over a longer time period. Using complete network data among coastal fishers from six villages in Kenya, we apply this approach to select key players for each type of conservation objective. We then draw on key informant interviews from seven resource management and conservation organizations working along the Kenyan coast to investigate whether the socioeconomic attributes of the key players we identified match the ones typically selected to facilitate conservation diffusion (i.e., ‘current players’). Our findings show clear discrepancies between current players and key players, highlighting missed opportunities for progressing more effective conservation diffusion. We conclude with specific criteria for selecting key stakeholders to facilitate each distinct conservation objective, thereby helping to mitigate the problem of stakeholder identification in ways that avoid blueprint approaches. These guidelines can also be applied in other research and intervention areas, such as community development studies, participatory research, and community intervention.

Complex social-ecological interactions underpin many environmental problems. To help capture this complexity, we advance an interdisciplinary network modeling framework to identify important relationships between people and nature that can influence environmental conditions. Drawing on comprehensive social and ecological data from five coral reef fishing communities in Kenya; including interviews with 648 fishers, underwater visual census data of reef ecosystem condition, and time-series landings data; we show that positive ecological conditions are associated with ‘social-ecological network closure’ – i.e., fully linked and thus closed network structures between social actors and ecological resources. Our results suggest that when fishers facing common dilemmas form cooperative communication ties with direct resource competitors, they may achieve positive gains in reef fish biomass and functional richness. Our work provides key empirical insight to a growing body of research on social-ecological alignment, and helps to advance an integrative framework that can be applied empirically in different social-ecological contexts., The relationships between people can have important consequences for the systems they depend on. Here the authors show that when coral reef fishers face commons dilemmas, the formation of cooperative communication with competitors can lead to positive gains in reef fish biomass and functional richness.

Harvesting common-pool fishery resources is often a competitive activity and important questions remain about the costs and benefits of engaging in cooperative behavior. Here, we link comprehensive data on fisher's information exchange networks and economic productivity to test hypotheses about when it pays to cooperate by exchanging different types of strategic information. We find that being well connected locally in information exchange networks about both short-term topics (e.g., the location of species) and long-term topics (e.g., technical innovations) is positively associated with productivity in both the short-term (within fishing trips) and long-term (annually). In contrast, we find that exchanging both types of information across distinct social divides – a form of brokerage – is negatively associated with productivity. Our results therefore suggest that while there appears to be an economic benefit associated with cooperation across temporal scales in the harvest of common-pool fishery resources, exchanging strategic information across social divides may come at a cost – particularly under conditions of competition. We discuss our results in light of emerging research at the nexus of sociology and economics, providing key insight into the social-structural dynamics that help form the foundation for fisher decision-making and behavior.

Coral reefs are increasingly threatened despite being essential to coastal and island economies, particularly in the Pacific. The diving industry relies on healthy reefs and can be positively and/or negatively impacted by ecological change. Quantifying divers' ecological preferences that influence economic outcomes can help inform managers and justify conservation. Utilizing non-market valuation, we assess SCUBA divers' preferences for ecological attributes of coral reef ecosystems in Guam, estimate WTP for coastal and watershed management, and investigate drivers influencing preferences. A discrete choice experiment grounded in ecosystem modeling reveals divers prefer reefs with greater ecological health (higher fish biomass, diversity, and charismatic species). Individuals with stronger environmental values expressed stronger ecological preferences. Fish biomass improvement from low ( 60g/m2) was worth >$2 million/year. The presence of sharks and turtles together was the preeminent attribute, worth $15–20million/year. Divers are willing to voluntarily contribute ($900thousand) towards watershed sediment-reduction projects that could benefit divers by improving reef conditions. Few policies are in place worldwide collecting fees from divers for coral reef management, and none in Guam. Our results suggest that understanding divers' preferences and the drivers behind them may assist managers in designing policies that capture divers WTP and create partners in conservation.

There is a growing body of literature positively linking dimensions of social capital to economic benefits. Yet recent research also points to a potential “dark side” of social capital, where over-embeddedness in networks and the pressures associated with brokerage are hypothesized to constrain actors, having a negative effect on economic outcomes. This dichotomy suggests that context is important, yet the overwhelming majority of existing empirical evidence stems from socially homogenous populations in corporate and organizational settings, limiting a broader understanding of when and how context matters. We advance this discourse to a socially fragmented, ethnically diverse common-pool resource system where information is highly valuable and competition is fierce. Merging several unique datasets from Hawaii's pelagic tuna fishery, we find that network prominence, i.e., being well connected locally, has a significant, positive effect on economic productivity. In contrast, we find that brokerage, defined here as ties that bridge either structurally distinct or ethnically distinct groups, has a significant, negative effect. Taken together, our results provide empirical support to widespread claims of the value of information access in common-pool resource systems, yet suggest that in ethnically diverse, competitive environments, brokers may be penalized for sharing information across social divides. Our results thus contribute to an emerging theory on the fragile nature of brokerage that recognizes its potential perils and the importance of context.

Attempts to better understand the social context in which conservation and environmental decisions are made has led to increased interest in human social networks. To improve the use of social-network analysis in conservation, we reviewed recent studies in the literature in which such methods were applied. In our review, we looked for problems in research design and analysis that limit the utility of network analysis. Nineteen of 55 articles published from January 2016 to June 2019 exhibited at least 1 of the following problems: application of analytical methods inadequate or sensitive to incomplete network data; application of statistical approaches that ignore dependency in the network; or lack of connection between the theoretical base, research question, and choice of analytical techniques. By drawing attention to these specific areas of concern and highlighting research frontiers and challenges, including causality, network dynamics, and new approaches, we responded to calls for increasing the rigorous application of social science in conservation.Consideraciones y Retos Importantes en la Aplicación de la Investigación por medio de Redes Sociales para la Toma de Decisiones Ambientales Resumen Los intentos por tener un mejor entendimiento del contexto social en el que se toman las decisiones ambientales y de conservación han derivado en un incremento en el interés por las redes sociales humanas. Para mejorar el uso del análisis de redes sociales en la conservación, buscamos en la literatura los estudios recientes que hayan aplicado dichos métodos y los sometimos a una revisión. En esta revisión, examinamos los problemas en el diseño de la investigación y del análisis que limitan la utilidad del análisis de redes. Diecinueve de los 55 artículos publicados entre enero 2016 y junio 2019 exhibieron al menos uno de los siguientes problemas: aplicación de métodos analíticos inadecuados o sensibles a la información incompleta sobre las redes; aplicación de estrategias estadísticas que ignoran la dependencia en la red; o falta de conexión entre la base teórica, la pregunta de investigación y la selección de técnica analítica. Al llamar la atención hacia estas áreas específicas de interés y resaltar las fronteras y retos de la investigación, incluyendo la causalidad, las dinámicas de redes y las estrategias nuevas, respondimos a la necesidad de incrementar la aplicación rigurosa de las ciencias sociales en la conservación.

Dynamic ocean management, or management that uses near real-time data to guide the spatial distribution of commercial activities, is an emerging approach to balance ocean resource use and conservation. Employing a wide range of data types, dynamic ocean management can be used to meet multiple objectives—for example, managing target quota, bycatch reduction, and reducing interactions with species of conservation concern. Here, we present several prominent examples of dynamic ocean management that highlight the utility, achievements, challenges, and potential of this approach. Regulatory frameworks and incentive structures, stakeholder participation, and technological applications that align with user capabilities are identified as key ingredients to support successful implementation. By addressing the variability inherent in ocean systems, dynamic ocean management represents a new approach to tackle the pressing challenges of managing a fluid and complex environment.

Effectively managing ecosystems is an information intensive endeavour. Yet social, cultural, and economic barriers can limit who is able to access information and how knowledge is exchanged. We draw on social network theory to examine whether co-management institutions break down these traditional barriers. We examined the factors that predict information access and knowledge exchange using interview and knowledge sharing network data from 616 Kenyan coral reef fishers operating in four communities with formal co-management institutions. For access to fisheries management information, we found disparities in fisher's age, leadership status, and wealth. Yet once we accounted for formal engagement in the co-management process, only wealth disparities remained significant. In contrast, knowledge exchange was insensitive to whether or not we accounted for engagement in co-management. We found that community leaders and external actors, such as NGO representatives, were primary sources of fisheries-related knowledge. Among fishers, knowledge exchange tended to occur more often between those using the same landing site. Fishers engaged in the co-management process and community leaders were likely to transfer knowledge widely (acting as ‘central communicators’), yet only leaders bridged disconnected groups (acting as ‘brokers’). Ethnic minorities and those with higher levels of education were more likely to fall on the periphery of the knowledge exchange networks. Taken together, our results suggest that co-management can break down traditional social and cultural – but perhaps not economic – barriers to information access; while social, cultural, and economic factors remain important for structuring knowledge exchange.

Social networks are frequently cited as vital for facilitating successful adaptation and transformation in linked social-ecological systems to overcome pressing resource management challenges. Yet confusion remains over the precise nature of adaptation vs. transformation and the specific social network structures that facilitate these processes. Here, we adopt a network perspective to theorize a continuum of structural capacities in social-ecological systems that set the stage for effective adaptation and transformation. We begin by drawing on the resilience literature and the multilayered action situation to link processes of change in social-ecological systems to decision making across multiple layers of rules underpinning societal organization. We then present a framework that hypothesizes seven specific social-ecological network configurations that lay the structural foundation necessary for facilitating adaptation and transformation, given the type and magnitude of human action required. A key contribution of the framework is explicit consideration of how social networks relate to ecological structures and the particular environmental problem at hand. Of the seven configurations identified, three are linked to capacities conducive to adaptation and three to transformation, and one is hypothesized to be important for facilitating both processes. We discuss how our theoretical framework can be applied in practice by highlighting existing empirical examples from related environmental governance contexts. Further extension of our hypotheses, particularly as more data become available, can ultimately help guide the design of institutional arrangements to be more effective at dealing with change.

[Extract] In two recent articles, Bohan et al. [1] and Dee et al. [2] develop conceptual arguments for the benefits of applying an interdisciplinary social–ecological network approach to the study of human–nature systems in general, and ecosystem services in particular. We agree. Network approaches can account for the interdependencies between complex human and ecological dynamics that underpin many important environmental problems (e.g., [3]). As such, their use has been advocated by several others as a fruitful way to bridge across the natural and social sciences in the development of new theories, frameworks, and tools for environmental problem-solving [4]. We emphasize here that conceptual thinking around social–ecological network sciences is now sufficiently mature to extend beyond the conceptual and look across disciplines to further develop actionable interdisciplinary research. To demonstrate this, we showcase a selection of past efforts and highlight an integrated social–ecological network approach that has already been applied empirically across a range of human–nature contexts. This is intended not only to complement Bohan et al. [1] and Dee et al. [2] but also to serve as a call for research on social–ecological networks to connect more with the existing interdisciplinary literature in the field.

Social networks can profoundly affect human behavior, which is the primary force driving environmental change. However, empirical evidence linking microlevel social interactions to large-scale environmental outcomes has remained scarce. Here, we leverage comprehensive data on information-sharing networks among large-scale commercial tuna fishers to examine how social networks relate to shark bycatch, a global environmental issue. We demonstrate that the tendency for fishers to primarily share information within their ethnic group creates segregated networks that are strongly correlated with shark bycatch. However, some fishers share information across ethnic lines, and examinations of their bycatch rates show that network contacts are more strongly related to fishing behaviors than ethnicity. Our findings indicate that social networks are tied to actions that can directly impact marine ecosystems, and that biases toward within-group ties may impede the diffusion of sustainable behaviors. Importantly, our analysis suggests that enhanced communication channels across segregated fisher groups could have prevented the incidental catch of over 46,000 sharks between 2008 and 2012 in a single commercial fishery.

Expanded polystyrene (EPS), a petroleum based plastic polystyrene, has an immense environmental impact with a degradation rate of over 500 years, and is a possible human carcinogen that may cause cancer in humans. Nonetheless, EPS is the most commonly used material to produce takeout food containers, a single use item that is quickly discarded. With growing recognition of the high environmental costs of EPS products and their pressure on landfill resources, EPS food container bans have become increasingly popular in jurisdictions across the globe. Similar legislation has been introduced in the state of Hawaii, USA. However, since EPS is currently more cost effective than its alternatives, the widespread adoption of food containers produced with biodegradable materials remains a challenge. This study employs Conjoint Choice Experiment (CCE) to determine consumer preference and willingness to pay for plant-based EPS alternative takeout food containers and their various product attributes in the urban center of Honolulu, Hawaii. Latent Class Analysis (LCA) is used to cluster respondents into four distinct classes based on their observable attributes of choice. Results show that the majority of respondents (81.0%) are in favor of a ban on EPS takeout food containers. As an alternative, the majority of respondents prefer a container constructed out of a sugarcane material (66.49%) that is microwaveable (88.94%), water resistant (100%), and locally produced (51.23%). Moreover, this study demonstrates an increase in consumer’s willingness to pay for more environmentally friendly food containers, which may allow businesses to offset the costs of substituting EPS for biodegradable materials. These findings provide valuable information for farmers, manufacturers, and natural resource managers, and can help to guide decision makers when considering socially responsible and environmentally sustainable policies.

Perhaps the most understudied ecosystem services are related to socio-cultural values tied to non-material benefits arising from human-ecosystem relationships. Bequest values linked to natural ecosystems can be particularly significant for indigenous communities whose livelihoods and cultures are tied to ecosystems. Here we apply a discrete choice experiment (DCE) to determine indigenous fishers’ preferences and willingness-to-pay for bequest gains from management actions in a locally managed marine area in Madagascar, and use our results to estimate an implicit discount rate. We validate our results using a unique rating and ranking game and other mixed methods. We find that bequest is highly valued and important; respondents were willing to pay a substantial portion of their income to protect ecosystems for future generations. Through all of our inquiries, bequest emerged as the highest priority, even when respondents were forced to make trade-offs among other livelihood-supporting ecosystem services. This study is among a relative few to quantify bequest values and apply a DCE to model trade-offs, value ecosystem service flows, and estimate discount rates in a developing country. Our results directly inform coastal management in Madagascar and elsewhere by providing information on the socio-cultural value of bequest in comparison to other ecosystem service benefits.