@phdthesis{Schoettker2020, author = {Sch{\"o}ttker, Oliver}, title = {Make-or-Buy: Should nature conservation agencies buy land and perform conservation activities on their own behalves, or should they pay farmers for voluntarily performing conservation activities?}, doi = {10.26127/BTUOpen-5271}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:co1-opus4-52713}, school = {BTU Cottbus - Senftenberg}, year = {2020}, abstract = {Anthropogenic threat for the world's environment and ecosystems and financial constraints necessitate a wise use of resources for the implementation of biodiversity conservation measures. A cost-effective planning and governance of biodiversity conservation has to be done to achieve maximal ecological outcomes with given financial resources. A better understanding of available modes of governance can help to improve the cost-effectiveness of biodiversity conservation planning and implementation. This thesis investigates the influence of governance mode choice on the cost-effectiveness for biodiversity conservation measure implementation in selected conceptual and empirical settings, and identifies ecological, economic and climatic factors of influence. Linking the cost-effectiveness analysis for biodiversity conservation measures to the make-or-buy decision enables a novel perspective on cost-effective biodiversity conservation. In this context, conservation agencies are assumed to have two main options to implement biodiversity conservation measures in principle: (1) the buy alternative in which land is purchased for the purpose of biodiversity conservation measure implementation, and (2) the compensation alternative where a conservation agency compensates landowner's opportunity costs to incentivise voluntary conservation measure implementation by landowners. Two conceptual ecological-economic models were developed to analyse the cost-effective governance mode choice and their sensitivity to changing ecological, economic and climatic parameters. Two empirical case studies were conducted to address the question of cost-effective governance mode choice for a conservation project in Schleswig-Holstein (Germany) and a federal state wide comparison of conservation activities in California (USA). It was found that the buy alternative is more cost-effective than the compensation alternative if conservation budgets and interest are high. In addition, not only the choice of governance mode is relevant with respect to cost-effectiveness, but also the mechanism to spatially select conservation sites chosen within a selected governance mode. Changing climate change speed - among other factors - influences the cost-effectiveness of governance modes and site selection strategies. The cost-effective governance mode choice also crucially depends on the intended timeframe of a conservation project. For shorter timeframes, compensating landowners is the cost-effective governance mode, however for longer durations the buy alternative becomes more cost-effective. This effect arises specifically due high one-off costs for buying land, which however amortize over time, compared to high recurring costs for compensating landowners. Based on these findings, the policy recommendations are provided which aim to improve the cost-effectiveness of governance modes available for biodiversity conservation.}, subject = {Biodiversity conservation; Cost-effectiveness; Ecological-economic modelling; Make-or-buy decision; Mode of governance; Biodiversit{\"a}tsschutz; Eigenfertigung-oder-Fremdbezug; Kosten-Effizienz; {\"O}kologisch-{\"o}konomische Modellierung; Steuerungsmodus; Naturschutzorganisation; Biodiversit{\"a}t; Effizienz; Make or buy; Naturschutz}, language = {en} }