The Ministry of Environmental Protection and Regional Development (VARAM) is able to find 7.8 million euros in national funding for this cruise – a process that feeds the participating organisations, but when it comes to talking about mechanisms for landowner involvement and fair compensation to achieve these same goals, the Minister for Environmental Protection and Regional Development, Artūrs Toms Plešs, claims that "it is expensive and it is a budgetary issue".

At the project's opening seminar, A. T. Plešs said: "The integrated project places significant emphasis on the involvement of interested parties, representing various sectors and viewpoints. I invite representatives of organisations that care about economic development and for whom economic interests are a priority, and those who care about nature conservation, to sit at the same table more often." So to speak: everyone is welcome on board!

And then let us look at who these anticipated stakeholder representatives are: state institutions – VARAM and the Nature Conservation Agency, scientific institutions – the University of Latvia, Daugavpils University, the Latvia University of Life Sciences and Technologies, companies such as AS Latvijas valsts meži and the Latvian Rural Advisory and Training Centre, and non-governmental organisations – the Latvian Fund for Nature and the World Wide Fund for Nature.

This is a chronic flaw in nature conservation policy – deciding for the people who manage land in Latvia while leaving them outside the door. It is now possible to participate remotely in a great many international seminars and project result presentations on ecosystem services and nature conservation on private land.