Landowners' decisions reshape landscapes, affecting the distribution and maintenance of ecosystem services (ESs). In Brazil, 53% of all remaining native vegetation is on private farms, reinforcing the importance of these stakeholders. The aim of this study was to identify landowners’ perceptions of the native areas on their properties as sources of ESs, to support future conservationist management strategies. We tested whether personal variables (gender, age and years of formal education), and farm characteristics (type and size) were determinant in their perceptions. We interviewed 75 landowners in the Brazilian savanna region, using a questionnaire and paired images strategy (e.g., pictures of soybean cultivation with and without native forest vegetation). Our analyses revealed that landowners perceive native areas as providing ESs. Gender, age and size of farm did not affect the landowners’ perceptions of ESs. However, we observed that years of formal education increased the chance of perceiving ESs which are more difficult to observe (pollination and pest regulation). Those services may require more scientific background to be understood. These results highlight with regard to perception of some ESs, education is a stronger factor than experience based on land-use activities.

土地所有者的决策重塑了景观，影响了生态系统服务（ESs）的分布和维护。在巴西，所有剩余的本地植被中有53％位于私人农场，这增强了这些利益相关者的重要性。这项研究的目的是确定土地所有者对本国土地作为ES的来源的理解，以支持未来的环境保护主义者的管理策略。我们测试了个人变量（性别，年龄和受正规教育的年限）和农场特征（类型和规模）是否在他们的观念中起决定作用。我们使用问卷调查和配对图像策略（例如，有或没有原生森林植被的大豆种植图片）采访了巴西热带稀树草原地区的75位土地所有者。我们的分析表明，土地所有者认为乡土地区提供了生态系统服务。性别，农场的年龄和规模并没有影响土地所有者对生态系统的看法。但是，我们观察到多年的正规教育增加了人们更容易观察到ES的机会（授粉和病虫害防治）。这些服务可能需要更多的科学背景才能被理解。这些结果突出表明，就某些ES的看法而言，教育是比基于土地使用活动的经验更重要的因素。