ИСТИНА

The total economic value (TEV) approach is applied to calculate the value of orchards and cropland in Azov district (Russia), including the values of ecosystem services (ES) provided by them. We estimate the cost of action vs cost of inaction against land degradation for the next 20 years to understand whether it is economically and ecologically efficient to re-establish orchards. Due to the lack of accurate estimates for the TEV of ecosystem services of these land uses in the local area, five different TEV's for orchards and croplands were triangulated using different methods. The results show that TEV for cropland in Azov district of Rostov region could lie within the range of 550-3803 USD per ha. The corresponding range of values for orchards is 1976-8481 USD.