Miriam Miranda, Ina T Porras and Mary Luz Moreno
In 1996 Costa Rica implemented an innovative programme of Payments for Environmental Services (PES). Through this programme, forest and plantation owners are financially rewarded and legally acknowledged for the environmental services their forests provide to the community, both nationally and globally. By means of a case study of the Virilla watershed in Costa Rica, this report uses the Sustainable Livelihoods Framework to analyse the social effects of the PES programme, and examines the effects the programme has had on financial, human, social, physical and environmental capital.