Partnering for Protecting Habitat in Rhode Island

Through an NRCS Conservation Innovation Grant, matching funds from the University of Rhode Island (URI) and EcoAsset Markets, Inc., and 200 James Town residents who each invested from $5 to $200; URI economists are helping protect habitat for nesting birds.  In a test of ecological investment markets for ecological services, farmers in Jamestown, Rhode Island, are being paid to delay haying their fields until after bobolinks, a grassland-nesting bird whose population is declining in New England, have completed nesting.

The project to protect habitat was designed by a team of University of Rhode Island economists in collaboration with a URI biologist and Providence based EcoAsset Markets, Inc.

“The public constantly says that they value a clean and healthy environment, and yet the economy overrides those values and  creates environmental problems instead,” said Stephen Swallow, a URI professor of environmental economics.  “Ecological markets are a way to correct these environmental problems by enabling businesses and individuals to express their values and invest in the environment. It’s a way of bringing environmental qualities into our everyday decision making.”

Farmers who grow hay for their livestock can usually get two cuttings a year from their fields, but the first one typically interferes with nesting grassland birds.  The mowing machines can destroy the birds’ nests, eggs and young.  By compensating the farmers for the cost of delaying the harvest and purchasing replacement hay, the birds have enough time to mature and fly away.

“This market approach is brand new,” said Emi Uchida, assistant research professor in the URI Department of Environmental and Natural Resource Economics.  “The Jamestown residents and farmers experienced one of the first experiments in the world to use a market approach to enhance ecosystem services.”

The Jamestown project was launched last fall with a comprehensive survey of residents to learn about their attitudes and environmental values.  The survey results helped the researchers determine the pricing strategies that would be most successful in raising the funds the farmers require.
Your contact is Todd McLeish, URI, at 401-874-7892.