Does economic valuation really influence policy?

Economic valuation of ecosystems aims to highlight the economic importance of ecosystems and the services they provide, with an eye toward influencing decision-makers to improve management to preserve services. However, through an ongoing review of actual policy influence by coastal ecosystem valuations in the Caribbean, we are coming to believe that such influence happens infrequently. In Jamaica, for example, we identified more than a dozen published coastal valuations and none had demonstrable policy influence.