Copyright © 2011 by the author(s). Published here under license by the Resilience Alliance. Villamor, G. B., and M. van Noordwijk. 2011. Social role-play games vs individual perceptions of conservation and PES agreements for maintaining rubber agroforests in Jambi (Sumatra), Indonesia. Ecology and Society 16(3): 27. http://dx.doi.org/10.5751/ES-04339-160327 Research Social Role-Play Games Vs Individual Perceptions of Conservation and PES Agreements for Maintaining Rubber Agroforests in Jambi (Sumatra), Indonesia Grace B. Villamor 1 and Meine van Noordwijk 2 ABSTRACT. Financial incentives can both support and undermine social norms compatible with environmental service enhancement. External co-investment—e.g., through incentives from programs to reduce emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD) and eco-certification—needs to synergize with local efforts by understanding local dynamics and conditions for free and prior informed consent. We assessed the perceptions and behavior of rubber agroforest farmers under existing conservation agreements as a step toward institutionalized reward schemes for agro-biodiversity using questionnaires and role- playing games (RPG). To our knowledge, this is the first attempt to apply such a combination of methods to explore the perceptions of payments for environmental services (PES). Results revealed a strong conservation belief system and social norms in the research site, with indications that individual interest in converting old rubber agroforest to oil palm, with consequent private gain and loss of local social agro- biodiversity benefits, is suppressed in the social context of a role-playing game. In the game, all financial bids by external agents to secure an oil palm foothold in the village, were rejected despite indications of declining income in the village. Agents promoting an eco-certification scheme in the RPG had success and the responses obtained in the game can assist in the actual rollout of such a scheme without creating unrealistic expectations of its financial benefits. Co-investment schemes that require higher levels of trust and clarity of performance measures will have to address the potential discrepancy between individual preferences and community-level planning and decisions, while recognizing that social norms color the responses of individuals when presented with alternatives. Key Words: conservation agreements; payments/rewards for agro-biodiversity conservation; role playing game; rubber agroforest INTRODUCTION Environmental services in the tropics are considerably diminished by the development and spread of land-use practices that profit the land user, but reduce the regularity and quality of water flows, habitat quality of the landscape for globally threatened biota, carbon storage capacity, and landscape beauty (Murdiyarso et al. 2002, Tomich et al. 2004). Although increased profitability may support development, the loss of environmental services affects the sustainability of overall resource use. Market-based instruments that make the continued provision of environmental services more profitable have become an active area of experimentation and learning over the past two decades (Engel et al. 2008), as purely regulatory approaches have a negative impact by perpetuating rural poverty. Market-based schemes to enhance environmental services in developing countries generally require monetizing biodiversity conservation, watershed protection, and carbon sequestration. Payment for environmental services (PES) schemes depend on funds derived from direct beneficiaries of such services, and/or an increased public interest in supporting conservation. These funds are used to offset legal opportunity costs of foregoing private benefits from activities with negative environmental effects (Peterson et al. 2010), and to provide additional income to land managers as a kind of poverty alleviation strategy, especially for poor areas in developing countries. Although most of the 1 Centre for Development Research, University of Bonn, 2 World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF)