Payment for Ecosystem Services: Potential of Establishing a Payment for Wildlife Ecosystem Services Market in the Okavango Delta, Botswana

Botswana's economy has long been mineral-driven, in particular, diamonds and the mining industry contributed 41.4 per cent share of GDP in 2005/06. However, with the expected leveling off of diamond extraction, there is need to diversify the economy. This book will show that tourism as a major potential sector in the economy, contributing 4.5 per cent share to GDP, can bring about shared economic growth and thus hasten the diversification of the economy. Nonetheless, tourism in Botswana is wildlife based but there is regular conflict of wildlife with the local communities. This implies that wildlife needs to be conserved and this book will show that past programs linking wildlife benefits and the local communities such as CBRNM have failed (Pagiola, 2006) to reach their conservation and long-term sustainable development goals. Consequently, mechanisms such as PES have to be instituted to circumvent the threats to wildlife as a source of benefits to the country. Two non-market valuation methods; contingent valuation and travel cost are used. The study revealed that there is a potential to establish a PES market in Botswana.