China and Vietnam have established some of the most promising Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) initiatives for watershed conservation and forest management. China's Sloping Land Conversion Program (SLCP) and Vietnam's pilot projects for subsequent Decision 380 PES laws are one such initiative. The selected research paper examines how these two actions are achieving their environmental and development objectives in terms of institutional arrangements, implementation in practice and sustainability prospects. The fundamental definition of PES has been defined as a voluntary transaction for distinct ecological services, with at least one buyer, one supplier, and based on the condition that payment continues only if the supplier or suppliers provide the defined ecosystem services to the buyer over the time period. . While PESs do not specifically target poverty reduction, these payments can provide better opportunities for service providers for diversified livelihoods and greater well-being with equitable incentives for the exchange of services. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Since both parties may receive benefits from the outcome of PES, acceptance by potential participants may be more for PES than for government laws or regulations. Incentive-based environmental policy programs, called PES or eco-compensation in China and Vietnam, have gained rapid development and global attention. There has been substantial political determination to expand pilot programs and to learn from the experiences of local diversification of national programs for the national and international environment. As a result of economic growth, rapid urbanization, population explosion, and increased demand for marginal land have negatively affected environmental conditions and natural resources. The main elements linked to land degradation include soil erosion, deterioration of water resources, deforestation, desertification and loss of biodiversity. The growing social and environmental problems arising from growing development discrepancies and the denudation of natural resources have been taken care of by both governments through the introduction of laws, institutional frameworks and public programmes. This study aims to create a vision for water and forest management, based on experiments with incentive-based schemes in these traditionally command-driven countries to achieve their environmental and development goals; and the implications for large-scale government-run programs in preserving the perception of PES from concept to action. This is assessed through examination of the programme's legal and institutional framework, implementation in practice and long-term sustainability prospects. The two national programs considered for study here are the Sloping Land Conversion Program (SLCP) in China and the PES pilot projects implemented in association with Decision 380 in Vietnam. Chinese SLCP Context: After the 1998 Yangtze River flood, the Chinese central government recognized the extreme impacts of steep slope agriculture on the ecological loss of forest and grassland services on slopes, in particular, the effect on runoff and soil erosion. SLCP was introduced in 1999 by the government and is also known as Grain for Green or Cropland to Forest and Grassland Programme, as the largest land retirement program known globally. Farmers in fields on slopes of 15-25° or higher havethe possibility of transforming the field into "ecological forest" (timber production) or "economic forest" (cultivation of cash crops). In exchange, they received a subsidy in kind, in grain or cash, on an annual basis. Depending on the type of conversion and the regional location of the land (with respect to the different fertility of the land), the compensation period was different. SLCP, the first national PES programme, could engage directly at the household level and encouraged voluntary participation in terms of choosing farmers for participation and type of land management. Vietnam's pilot projects implementing Decision 380 and subsequent PES legislation: With mountainous terrain and monsoon climate, rural mountain forest hydrographic services play a significant role in Vietnam's economy, primarily as an agricultural and hydropower sector. The incentive-based program, Program 661 (Decision No. 661/QD-TTg/1998), introduced by the Vietnamese government to promote sustainable development which aimed to increase forest cover by five million hectares within a 12-year period (1998 -2010). In 2007, Decision no. 380/QD-TTg/2008, a national policy on PES contained legal, institutional and financial guidelines relating to PES. Important forest watershed services such as water flow regulation, soil erosion reduction, and scenic landscaping have been economically valued based on the 380 program. Son La and Lam Dong provinces identified as PES pilot tests generate a 'high demand for municipal water and hydroelectric power developments arise from dense population; Furthermore, these provinces have the potential to integrate land management activities with biodiversity conservation and tourism from nearby national parks. Conveniently, three classes of “buyers” have been specified: hydroelectric plants, water suppliers and tourism companies. In September 2010, the study on the success of the pilot projects associated with Decision 380 was developed as the National Law on “Payments for Forest Ecosystem Services” (Decree 99-CP, 2010). Evaluation of the Decision 380 and Legal, Institutional and Administrative SLCP pilot projects: Multiple agencies were involved in the SLCP, including departments from forestry and grain supply, to finance and land management, including the Ministry of Lands and resources, the Ministry of Agriculture, the State Forestry Administration (SFA) and the Ministry of Agriculture. Water resources. The agencies were involved in providing compensation (in cash and grain), managing land contracts with farmers, negotiating disputes, selecting and measuring land area for conversion, distributing saplings or herbaceous species, issuing contracts and monitoring conversion results. There are no specific legal guidelines for establishing PES-like approaches in China. Although the complete ownership rights of natural resources and lands belong to the State, by SLCP the right to use and manage the land was granted during the period of the SLCP contract. Under this “whoever plants, keeps and benefits” policy, land users are allowed to manage and benefit from the products and services on their assigned land. Decision 380: elaborates the term "forest ecosystem services" (FES) for the national legal framework by defining the logic of payments, as well as the responsibilities and rights of the contracting parties. Furthermore, it defines the calculation method, form and duration of payments, manages and implements payment operations, the roles of executive agencies and the budget in relation to the source offinancing. Although the scheme supports payments based on direct negotiations, the text of the document implies mandatory participation for both buyers and providers of the service. If Decision 380 mandates the specific payment rate for interested parties, it appears that the fees and taxes approach has been adopted. It appears that participation is not based on voluntary negotiations. The configuration of the institutional framework promotes vertical collaboration between different ministries for the preparation of national PES, but horizontal collaboration has posed a limited and imposing challenge for effective and efficient implementation of PES. Land use rights in Vietnam are restrictive and include factors such as user group, forest type and classification, forest allocation, and source of investment. The institutional framework helps maintain and improve environmental well-being synergies SLCP Implementation: SLCP has achieved rapid expansion thanks to political support an ambitious goal, from an initial pilot phase in 2001 with three upstream provinces to reach 25 provinces by 2006. In the same period, the conversion rate is six times higher. Due to the diverse and undocumented local implementation, with limited documentation on locality-specific opportunities and resources, it has been difficult to draw definitive conclusions about the implications of the SLCP. Significant removal of sloping agricultural land was observed, but the associated impact on watershed protection, as the primary objective, was unclear. Additionally, an emphasis on tree planting was not the only solution to protecting sloping land, but rather factors such as land use, type of vegetation cover, and catchment size also impact catchment management. Furthermore, the monocultural approach of reforestation has resulted in limited biodiversity. The absence of pre-SLCP prototype forest studies within the target areas limits the ability to substantiate the claims. Local agency budget shortfalls have resulted in poor monitoring and enforcement of the SLCP and a failure to coordinate with farmers and provide technical assistance with planting. Again, regardless of local conditions, land use practices or household needs, some farmers have been forced to adopt a program subscribed to by neighbors and village councils to achieve the conversion targets set by the councils. upper centers. In the poorer province of Ningxia, 80% of sampled farmers were forced to participate in the SLCP. Decision 380: involved a huge amount of payment flows. (VND62 billion, equivalent to $2 million) within one to two years. Since the commissioning period of the pilot implementation was very short (2009-2010), with payments disbursed and law enactment as priorities, evaluative assessments become difficult. However, for successful implementation, sensitivity analysis was carried out for rehabilitation of critical ecological habitats, community level awareness initiatives with capacity building and specialized training. Furthermore, due to poor availability of information on the state of forests and imprecise clarification and implementation of voluntary transactions, rapid implementation encountered problems. Livelihood Impacts and Sustainability SLCP: The SLCP program indirectly targets the poor as traditionally poor families reside on the marginalized sloping plateaus of China's major watershed. The poor farmers are really improved according to the opportunities of means of.