Pristine Paradise Environmental Fee — Palau's Statutory Tourism Levy for Protected Areas

Palau introduced a $30 'Green Fee' in 2006, folded into airline tickets, with $15 of each fee legally earmarked for the Protected Areas Network (PAN) Fund. In 2018 the national legislature (Palau National Code, as amended by RPPL 10-2) replaced it with the $100 Pristine Paradise Environmental Fee (PPEF), levied on every arriving visitor. The law codifies exactly how the fee is split: $10 to the Fisheries Protection Trust Fund, $12.50 shared among Palau's 16 state governments for local environmental management, $22.50 to the national treasury, $25 to Palau International Airport, and $30 to the PAN Fund and the Palau National Marine Sanctuary (with the PAN Fund's own allocation capped at $2 million a year).

Between 2012 and 2019, the Green Fee/PPEF mechanism raised more than $13 million for the PAN Fund; Palau's government projected roughly $7 million generated in fiscal year 2025 from the wider fee, with the levy expected to yield around $10 million a year at full tourism recovery. Of PAN Fund disbursements, about 60% goes to the individual states for on-the-ground site management, 20% to PAN operations and 20% to reserves and special projects. The revenue supports 88 protected-area staff managing 39 sites — 29 marine and 10 terrestrial — spanning all 16 Palauan states and covering more than 1,100 square kilometres, including the Palau National Marine Sanctuary. Nearly one million visitors had taken the accompanying 'Palau Pledge' conservation commitment stamped into their passports by April 2024.

Independent analysis by the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Reef Resilience Network cites Palau as a reference model now being studied and adapted by other Pacific and Caribbean island states (and discussed as an option for Hawai'i). The same analyses note a persistent funding gap: dedicated fee revenue covers only around 58% of the PAN's documented annual management costs, leaving roughly $1 million a year to be raised from other sources.

Read the full analysis: https://www.pew.org/en/research-and-analysis/articles/2026/03/11/how-island-nations-can-harness-tourist-dollars-for-conservation