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The natural capital framework for sustainably efficient and equitable decision making
Abstract
The concept of ‘natural capital’ is gaining traction internationally as recognition grows of the central role of the natural environment in sustaining economic and social well-being. It is therefore encouraging to see the first signs of a ‘natural capital approach’ to decision making being accepted within government policy processes and the private sector. However, there are multiple different understandings of this ‘approach’, many of which misuse or omit key features of its foundations in natural science and economics. To address this, we present a framework for natural capital analysis and decision making that links ecological and economic perspectives. The natural capital concept is making way into government policy processes and the private sector, but different understandings of the approach might lead to misuse or omissions. In order to address this issue, a comprehensive framework for natural capital analysis and decision making is presented.
... For the purpose of monitoring the contribution of nature to welfare, natural capital accounting potentially has multifaceted roles in policymaking. Estimating the quantity and assessing the quality of natural capital assets systematically, as well as the benefits they provide to the economy and society, reveals how the use of resources influences economic development, thus providing opportunities for increasing the efficient use of natural resources, as well as for their protection (Badura et al., 2017;Bateman and Mace, 2020). The identification of pressures and possible risks provides the basis for an evaluation of the effectiveness of policy instruments and fosters the adoption of practices that promote sustainability (Mace et al., 2015). ...
... Natural capital accounts assess the stock value of natural capital and can signal whether PoMs contribute to sustainability. This is particularly important for appraisals of spending options, where considerations such as securing benefits for future generations need to be considered (Bateman and Mace, 2020). ...
... The term Natural Capital was introduced by David Pearce in 1988, and can broadly be defined as the quantity of natural resources and the ecological services they provided that when combined with manmade and financial capital result in the provision of marketed products and intangible benefits that satisfy human needs (Bateman and Mace, 2020). One such study is that of Wang et al. (2021) who by investigating the level of economic development and natural capital in China, found that the pattern of demand for the latter across regions varies significantly, depending among others on the industrial structure, population size and energy efficiency. ...
... According to the conventional theory of economic development, environmental sustainability and economic growth are mutually exclusive. In other words, economic development can stimulate quick economic growth by committing significant amounts of production resources at the expense of depleting natural resources [1,2]. In addition to pitting ecological environmental protection against economic development, this development strategy also ignores the ecological carrying capacity. ...
... Table 6 shows related regression results. The estimation results in column (1) show that none of the regression coefficients are significant for the five years before the establishment of PFTZs. This indicates that there is no significant difference between the experimental and control groups in the level of regional green dual-circulation development before the establishment of PFTZs. ...
... near c is a region dummy variable that takes the value of 0 or 1. near c = 1 denotes the neighboring province c where PFTZ is built; conversely, near c = 0. nearpost t denotes the time dummy variable. If PFTZ has established around province c after t-th year, then nearpost t = 1; otherwise, the value is assigned to 0. The model's additional variables and parameters are identical to those in the model (1). α 2 is the test of whether PFTZ produces the radiative or siphon effect. ...
Accelerating the formation of a green dual-circulation pattern is an essential strategic choice for China to achieve high-quality development. As a vital link for two-way economic and trade cooperation, the pilot free trade zone (PFTZ) is an important window for promoting green dual-circulation development. From the perspective of green dual-circulation, this paper attempts to construct a comprehensive index system of green dual-circulation by entropy weight method based on Chinese provincial panel data from 2007 to 2020 and uses the Propensity Score Matching-Difference in Differences method to test the policy impact of PFTZ building on regional green dual-circulation. The empirical results show that: (1) the establishment of PFTZs significantly promotes regional green dual-circulation development by 3%-4%. This policy effect has a strong positive impact on the eastern regions; (2) PFTZs can improve regional green dual circulation through the effect of green finance, technological progress, and the agglomeration of innovative talents. The mediating effect of green finance and technological progress is more pronounced; (3) The promotion effect of PFTZs is primarily due to the local green circulation effect, with no significant effects on the surrounding areas; and (4) There is a positive policy linkage effect between PFTZs and the Belt and Road Initiative. This study creates the analytical perspective and empirical support for assessing the policy impact of PFTZs and provides management insights for PFTZ policymakers in promoting green dual-circulation development.
... For clarity, ecosystem services are generally classified into three broad categories including: provisioning; regulating and maintenance, and cultural services (Haines-Young and Potschin, 2018). When combined with good governance principles, information on natural capital can ensure the sustainable, effective and equitable use of resources, critical in the climate crisis (Bateman and Mace, 2020). Ecosystem accounting is a tool to measure how the flow of services from ecosystems contribute to societal wellbeing and evolution over time (La Notte and Rhodes, 2020;Maes et al., 2020). ...
... Biodiversity is inherently difficult to include in accounts due to its multidimensional use and non-use values (Bateman and Mace, 2020). Whilst it is agreed that there is an urgent need for conceptual frameworks and assessment approaches to the monetary valuation of biodiversity, under SEEA for an ecosystem service to 'exist' it must be able to be supplied in physical terms and exchanged in monetary terms by people. ...
Ecosystem accounting is a systematic approach that combines environmental and economic data to track the full physical and monetary value of natural capital and can be applied at various spatial scales and for a range of purposes. Our main objective is to identify where and how ecosystem accounting has been applied in the specific context of forest resource management. We selected the System of Economic Ecosystem Accounting (SEEA) Ecosystem Accounting (EA) which is aligned with national accounting for our analysis. Our systematic literature review was conducted on publications between 2012 and 2023 that apply SEEA EA consistent methodology for forest ecosystems globally. We find the use of SEEA EA consistent ecosystem accounts in forestry have been limited and tends to occur where governmental and institutional support is available. Detailed analysis of forestry case studies identified gaps and challenges including the variation in which SEEA EA had been applied, limited number of ecosystem services reported, issues related to valuation, and a lack of industry adoption. The results of this review highlight the urgent need to make ecosystem accounting more achievable and accessible in the forest sector to ensure that quantifying forest natural capital is mainstreamed for decision and policy processes.
... Ecosystem services (ES) may be defined as the human benefits generated by nature, such as forest, fauna, water, soil, or minerals, the latter being the stock of renewable and non-renewable resources that, using economic terminology, can also be identified as natural capital [156]. ES are drivers of social wellbeing emerging through their interaction with human and social capitals [157]. ...
... ES are drivers of social wellbeing emerging through their interaction with human and social capitals [157]. For instance, the contribution to human wellbeing derived from forestry and agriculture ecosystems requires human labor energy, and capital (machinery) input to convert them in societal benefits (e.g., crops and timber) [156]. ...
This paper presents a review of concepts related to wildfire risk assessment, including the determination of fire ignition and propagation (fire danger), the extent to which fire may spatially overlap with valued assets (exposure), and the potential losses and resilience to those losses (vulnerability). This is followed by a brief discussion of how these concepts can be integrated and connected to mitigation and adaptation efforts. We then review operational fire risk systems in place in various parts of the world. Finally, we propose an integrated fire risk system being developed under the FirEUrisk European project, as an example of how the different risk components (including danger, exposure and vulnerability) can be generated and combined into synthetic risk indices to provide a more comprehensive wildfire risk assessment, but also to consider where and on what variables reduction efforts should be stressed and to envisage policies to be better adapted to future fire regimes. Climate and socio-economic changes entail that wildfires are becoming even more a critical environmental hazard; extreme fires are observed in many areas of the world that regularly experience fire, yet fire activity is also increasing in areas where wildfires were previously rare. To mitigate the negative impacts of fire, those responsible for managing risk must leverage the information available through the risk assessment process, along with an improved understanding on how the various components of risk can be targeted to improve and optimize the many strategies for mitigation and adaptation to an increasing fire risk.
... Another notion of how to bring about change is through making gradual shifts. Bateman et al. (2020), propose that humans see their interwovenness with other humans, animals and plants, but that they remain at the centre of control, with the human responsibility to find solutions to diminish their impact on their environment. The author concurs with Bateman's (2020) idea of a gradual, yet focused shift to undo the destruction of our Anthropocene past. ...
... Bateman et al. (2020), propose that humans see their interwovenness with other humans, animals and plants, but that they remain at the centre of control, with the human responsibility to find solutions to diminish their impact on their environment. The author concurs with Bateman's (2020) idea of a gradual, yet focused shift to undo the destruction of our Anthropocene past. Although time is of the essence, using a gradual shift as a mode of change can be more realistic, and should be done in a contextually appropriate way. ...
Parents, or pre-school educators in early childhood education, focus on assisting children to attain the highest possible pre-numeracy and pre-literacy skills in an attempt to give children a better academic foundation. Children are presented with technology, for example, in the form of a tablet, that act as baby-sitters even before they can speak properly, and this has largely deafened them to the sounds of nature. Sounds of man and machine are the only ones most children will be exposed to, due to their living in cities with few natural spaces. Children are not taken into nature to experience it and get to know the sounds of the bio-network, of which they are an integral part. Rural children may have a better chance to get to know, respect and cherish nature, due to their context, but their guides - parents and/or communities - have sunken into their own disregard for their environment. It is only when children are taught to listen to and appreciate nature that they will be enabled to begin moving back to being ‘mensch’ where the focus, ironically, moves away from the human and focuses instead on creating an equilibrium between humanity and nature, rather than stripping the planet of its natural resources through harmful practices. This empirical research explored the literature to highlight the significance of listening as a mode of developing an appreciation of and caring for nature. Attuning children of the post-humanist era to their natural environment through listening will encourage them to understand their function as part of nature, and assist in the restoration of the planet.
... Therefore, ensuring its sustainability is crucial to achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly SDG12 responsible consumption and production (Fairbrass et al., 2020). However, increasing evidence shows that the natural capital balance is declining, causing ecosystem pressure to approach or even exceed certain irreversible thresholds (Vardon et al., 2021;Bateman and Mace, 2020). The Global Footprint Network (2019) highlighted that the current rate of ecological resource utilization by humans exceeds 75% of the Earth's ecosystem revival rate. ...
... However, the monetary measurement of natural capital tends to obscure the issue of ecological thresholds, and does not account for the rising marginal prices of ecological products and the effects of currency depreciation (Zhang et al., 2017). Moreover, as ecosystems approach or reach critical thresholds, the limitations of monetary valuations become more pronounced, even a small decline in the physical quantity could substantially increase the marginal economic value of natural capital (Hayha and Franzese, 2014;Bateman and Mace, 2020). Thus, an assessment framework for natural capital that combines the advantages of physical and monetary accounting has become a key goal in current research. ...
Natural capital is a constraint on sustainable development goals. There are multiple methods available for natural capital accounting, many of which are inconsistent with each other in accounting items. Another common defect is an inability to represent both physical and monetary quantities. To address these issues, we integrated the ecological footprint and ecosystem service methods by introducing ecosystem service equivalence factors that facilitate the formulation of a standardized and flexible natural capital accounting framework. Adopting the provinces along the Silk Road Economic Belt (SREB) in China as the target research area, this study calculated and analyzed the spatiotemporal evolution of natural capital utilization and ecological pressure from 2000 to 2020. The results revealed that the supply of natural capital in China's SREB cannot meet consumer demands, resulting in the expansion of the ecological deficits. From 2000 to 2020, the physical and monetary quantities of ecological footprint per capita in the SREB increased by 2.51 and 3.66 times and the ecological carrying capacity per capita decreased by 6.81% in physical terms, gradually increasing by 59.93% in monetary terms. The physical and monetary quantities of ecological deficit per capita continued expanding negatively, at rates of -0.133 nha/cap/yr and -299.837 CNY/cap/yr, respectively. Integrating the physical and monetary dimensions, the sustainability of natural capital in China's SREB was weakening, and the ecological pressure was increasing step by step, from the low-relatively low (L-RL) class to the relatively high-relatively high (RH-RH) class. Ningxia, Chongqing, Shaanxi, Guangxi and Xinjiang were the provinces facing the greatest ecological challenges along the SREB in China, while Qinghai faced the least ecological pressure. These findings provide a reference for the scientific utilization and management of natural capital in provinces along the SREB in China. Additionally, the proposed framework enriches the interactive research achievements of ecological footprint and ecosystem service theories, in ways that not only compensate for the lack of monetary quantity in the ecological footprint, but also have the potential to serve the compilation of China's government-mandated Natural Resource Balance Sheet.
... The notion of natural capital is used to describe components of the natural environment that provide valuable goods or services that are critical for society including minerals, fuels, animals, plants or ecosystems [71][72][73]. The need to monitor the state and trends of natural capital has motivated the creation of the Natural Capital Index (NCI). ...
... The use of NCI allows policymakers to track their action and their progress in preserving or improving their natural capital, which includes preserving the biodiversity within their countries, preserving their natural resources and progressing towards a more sustainable development [71], [73]. The use of this framework encourages a transition away from production-based indicators towards the consideration of ecological assets, which can be aligned with some of the elements that compose the CE. ...
The circular economy has the potential to promote systemic change towards a sustainable future. However, the dominance of technical and market-oriented considerations has placed the circular economy as part of an eco-modernist agenda, which retains growth in gross domestic product as the overarching priority. In this context, we analyse 12 existing macroeconomic indicators, developed and implemented by governments and international organisations, and determine if they could enact alternative notions of circularity. Specifically, we focus on the performative role that indicators can play in both defining and surmounting such reductionist views, thus helping us to address the world we want to create. We find that many of these indicators are agents of the status quo, but that some could disrupt the omnipotence of GDP thereby getting the macroeconomic conditions right for a more ambitious understanding of the circular economy.
... The complexity of business-nature relations stems from how, across the biosphere, multiple human organisations interact with, and impact upon, multiple ecological biomes in multiple places (Cuckston, 2021). By reducing nature down to stocks of so-called environmental assets and flows of so-called ecosystem services, the economisation of nature as natural capital treats nature as if it is a simple economic resource, analogous to financial capital (Bateman & Mace, 2020;Mace, 2019). ...
... Indeed, nature conservation and restoration can be understood as the organising and managing of socio-ecological systems in particular places in ways that protect and enhance the integrity of the biomes in those places (Cuckston, 2021;Eden, Tunstall, & Tapsell, 2000). Initiatives aimed at economising nature purportedly seek to facilitate this organising and managing of nature by enabling managers to understand nature in economic terms (Bateman & Mace, 2020). ...
... Incorporating the assessment of ecosystem services, the benefits that humans receive from ecosystems, into land management decisions is increasingly recognized as an opportunity to support sustainable development (Bateman & Mace, 2020;Guerry et al., 2015). ...
... Impacts associated with intensive agricultural production systems on natural and semi-natural ecosystems are of growing concern (Garibaldi et al., 2017). Consequently, numerous efforts are underway to operationalize ecosystem service frameworks as tools for decision-making (Bateman & Mace, 2020). Yet, mainstreaming ecosystem services into land management has proven challenging (Reyers et al., 2015). ...
Incorporating the assessment of ecosystem services into land management decisions is increasingly recognized as an opportunity to support sustainable development. This, however, can be particularly challenging within the productive sector, a highly technical system often driven by multi‐level private entities.
Here we present five key challenges, and suggest their corresponding solutions, when promoting the operationalization of ecosystem services within agribusiness. The challenges we developed are as follows: (a) building a common understanding of ecosystem services; (b) navigating strong power dynamics; (c) a highly technical system with diverse types of expertise; (d) limited understanding of the opportunity costs of alternative practices and (e), dealing with uncertainty.
We draw on our experience generated through the Wine, Climate Change and Biodiversity programme, a science‐based initiative promoting the conservation of biodiversity and strategic use of ecosystem services in Chilean vineyards.
Synthesis and applications . This perspective piece provides advice to scientists and practitioners on how to navigate technical and practical challenges when promoting the incorporation of ecosystem services into agricultural management. While the assessment of ecosystem services can be a highly technical process, its successful integration into land management decisions relies on active engagement, balancing expectations and an ability to construct a shared understanding among different stakeholders. The approaches suggested here rely on principles of co‐production and are illustrated with examples that are transferable to other crop and geographical contexts.
... Indicators to facilitate decision-makingi.e., to support effective governanceare urgently needed to encourage human development within the limits of sustainable nature in the first place. In this aspect, decarbonization, for example, should overcome the influence of vested interests of individual countries (Sachs et al., 2022;2020) (Beteman andMace, 2020). Following the COVID-19 conference in the Group of Twenty (G20) countries, fossil fuels have already been allocated almost twice the amount allocated to renewable energies in the recovery funds. ...
... The importance of natural capital is increasingly recognised (Bateman and Mace, 2020), and is the subject of major research programmes and policy debates, although it has been challenging to operationalise the concept through national accounts which include both natural and financial capital flows. Efforts are well advanced in the context of the EU (the European Environmental Economic Accounts (EEEA)) and the UN (System of Environmental Economic Accounting (SEEA)), but data and methods are far from being at the quality level of those used to monitor conventional national accounts. ...
The concept of sustainable forest management was developed in the 1990s and puts ecological, economic and socio-economic ecosystem functions on the same level. However, society is now making new and complex, not necessarily mutually compatible, demands on forests, for instance in the fields of climate change, renewable energy and biodiversity conservation. Policy instruments that address these societal demands and translate them into legally binding regulations have far-reaching consequences for forest management and put pressure on the
traditional, non-legally binding framework for international forest policy. Faced with these radical changes, we conclude there is a need for an in-depth review of the concept of sustainable forest management.
... While the concept of 'resources' typically frames natural assets as inputs for human use or consumption (Bateman & Mace, 2020), recent surfing scholarship has broadened the perspective to consider surf breaks as part of connective seascapes, referred to as 'surfing ecosystems ' (arroyo et al., 2020;Manero, 2023;Reineman et al., 2021). here, we define 'surfing ecosystems' the spaces and complex interactions between the multiple living and non-living components of ocean and coastal environments were surfing takes place. ...
... These resources, such as land, minerals, fossil fuels, forests, and fisheries, generate a flow of goods (e.g., food and energy), services (e.g., climate regulation, waste management, and environmental amenities), and income (Goodland and Ledec, 1987;Acosta et al., 2020). Collectively, natural capital and its accompanying flow of valuables are referred to as natural resources (Bateman and Mace, 2020). Thus, nations are blessed with abundant land, forests, fossil fuels, and solid minerals, which serve as essential inputs in the production of goods and services. ...
... These alternatives can be different situations from personal ones to the choices through an organization. When you select a choice between all available possibilities, the process is decision-making [15][16]. The aim of decision-making is both identifying all possible alternatives and choosing the best one out of available choices that fit the expected goals and objectives. ...
Decision-making is one of the steps in problem-solving that can be applied in manifold areas from personal situations to the management of organizations. There are functions and processes to lead to making a decision; however, it may sound complicated to select between decision-making models and approaches as different factors and different outcomes get involved in the decision-making process. This article is a survey of decision-making with managerial insight to explain what it is, what kinds of decisions are made, and how they are applied in many sectors, including computers, management, business, psychology, etc. This paper aims to provide an overview of the decision-making concept, its functions, process steps, and its main types, models, and categories. Overall, it provides valuable insights for individuals and organizations seeking to improve their decision-making abilities.
... The importance of natural capital is increasingly recognised (Bateman and Mace, 2020), and is the subject of major research programmes and policy debates, although it has been challenging to operationalise the concept through national accounts which include both natural and financial capital flows. Efforts are well advanced in the context of the EU (the European Environmental Economic Accounts (EEEA)) and the UN (System of Environmental Economic Accounting (SEEA)), but data and methods are far from being at the quality level of those used to monitor conventional national accounts. ...
The concept of sustainable forest management was developed in the 1990s and puts ecological, economic and socio-
economic ecosystem functions on the same level. However, society is now making new and complex, not necessarily
mutually compatible, demands on forests, for instance in the fields of climate change, renewable energy
and biodiversity conservation. Policy instruments that address these societal demands and translate them into
legally binding regulations have far-reaching consequences for forest management and put pressure on the traditional,
non-legally binding framework for international forest policy. Faced with these radical changes, we conclude
there is a need for an in-depth review of the concept of sustainable forest management.
... Un autre concept anthropocentrique est celui de "capital naturel", qui est lié aux services écosystémiques mais se concentre sur le stock de ressources naturelles et moins sur le flux de services bénéficiant à l'homme (Bateman & Mace, 2020). Ce concept a également gagné en importance ces dernières années, notamment en tant qu'outil de décision pour la gestion durable de la nature à long terme et la prise en compte de l'équité intergénérationnelle. Se concentrer uniquement sur les tendances en matière de fourniture de services écosystémiques est insuffisant, car la fourniture actuelle de services écosystémiques peut être augmentée temporairement en réduisant le capital naturel (Guerry et al., 2015). ...
Mes activités de recherche ont principalement porté sur l'économie appliquée des ressources naturelles et de l'environnement et, dans une certaine mesure, sur l'économie régionale et le développement rural. Depuis 2009, mes recherches à l'INRA/INRAE (LEF, puis BETA) ont principalement porté sur l'évaluation des services écosystémiques (forestiers) dans un contexte spatial explicite mais aussi porté sur la régulation de l'utilisation des sols et la fourniture de services écosystémiques. Mon approche de l'évaluation économique a été principalement basée sur des expériences par choix discrets et la méthode des coûts de déplacement. Plus récemment, j'ai également appliqué des éléments d'économie comportementale pour analyser les décisions de gestion des propriétaires forestiers. Avant d'occuper mon poste à INRAE, j'ai d'abord été chercheur à « l'Institute of Food and Resource Economics » à Copenhague où, en plus de mener des recherches sur la réglementation agro-environnementale et le développement rural, j'ai été impliqué dans de nombreux projets visant à fournir une expertise basée sur la recherche aux agences gouvernementales. Plus tard, j'ai été professeur assistant en économie de l'environnement à l'université de Copenhague. Depuis le début de ma carrière de chercheur, j'ai coordonné ou participé à un grand nombre de projets financés par des fonds externes (37), dont beaucoup impliquaient des participants d'autres disciplines et une coopération internationale.
Mon projet scientifique s'inscrit dans la continuité de mes recherches antérieures. En particulier, je contribuerai à la méthodologie de l'évaluation économique des services écosystémiques non marchands en mettant l'accent sur les services récréatifs et sur l'utilisation de la méthode des coûts de déplacement et de l'expérience par choix discrets. En outre, je continuerai à analyser les déterminants, les coûts et les avantages des changements d'utilisation des sols dans le but de mieux concevoir des réglementations spatialement ciblées. Une autre contribution attendue est, par le biais d'interactions avec des scientifiques d'autres disciplines et des utilisateurs finaux de la recherche, de développer des approches d'évaluation qui rendent les résultats des analyses coûts-bénéfices plus pertinents et crédibles pour la prise de décision politique. Enfin, la régulation de la gestion des écosystèmes par des approches volontaires et l'impact du développement de nouveaux marchés des écosystèmes pour les services environnementaux seront également analysés. Cette dernière partie bénéficiera des éclairages apportés par l'économie comportementale.
... Moreover, analyzing the functional Reviews revealed that in most cases qualitative statements about the dependency of the technosphere system from the NC are made without exploring the relationships between the demand and supply of resources and ecosystem services. In fact, quantitative statements only occur when a pilot analysis or a use case is offered to illustrate the proposed review-based framework, such as in the case of a natural capital analysis in support of decision-making that links ecological and economic perspectives [53]. Not surprisingly, the natural capital protocol (NCP) method is also substantially investigated across the functional Reviews [54,55], although from a qualitative and conceptual perspective only. ...
Natural Capital Accounting (NCA) is becoming a reference tool for an increasing number of organizations transitioning towards environmental impact neutrality. However, one NCA technique applicable to all types of actors (individual, community, company, etc.) is missing because of the lack of consensus on how to quantify both their environmental impacts and dependencies on ecosystems. A coupled systematic and non-systematic review of the grey and scientific literature is performed here to (i) make an extensive review of state-of-the-art NCA methods, identifying their current utilization and limitations, and (ii) discern prospects about the challenges of integrating an Ecosystem Service Accounting in Life Cycle Assessment (ESA-LCA). While NCA methods can extensively evaluate the supply of ES, they tend to disregard the quantification of environmental impacts that imply a demand for ES. The ESA-LCA approach is identified as a robust solution to balance supply and demand of ecosystem services in NCA, allowing private and public actors to quantify their distance from impact neutrality targets. A novel definition of NC(A) in LCA is also formulated to support these future efforts, promoting a Mitigation Hierarchy-based strategy to avoid, minimize, restore, and offset impacts, and outlining a roadmap for practitioners to apply ESA-LCA across multiple economic sectors.
... MSP processes address in a comprehensive way the social, economic and environmental dimensions of space, focusing on their harmonious coexistence with, and sustainable use of marine resources Tsilimigkas, Rempis, & Derdemezi, 2020). It is important to mention that MSP relates to two main but different concepts of sustainability -depending on how it is perceived-and is considered to be the "natural capital" (Qiu & Jones, 2013;Bateman & Mace, 2020). ...
The paper, is in Greek as well as in English, focuses on the evolution of the territorial planning system in Greece and its connection to the maritime spatial system, as well as on key issues of methodology and implementation for Maritime Spatial Planning: References are made to issues regarding the spatial level of its implementation in Greece, its relation to land-based spatial planning, the degree of its bindingness and its connection to the development policy. The paper further highlights the fact that with their introduction, marine spatial planning tools will become the new generation of spatial planning tools, which will include provisions to ensure synergies between activities and will prevent and remedy conflicts between uses, where these arise. It is also clarified that specific frameworks for Maritime Spatial Planning have yet to be drafted and introduced in Greece. The National Spatial Strategy for the Marine Space is currently in the process of being introduced, while the first Maritime Spatial Planning Framework is expected to be completed in the very near future for the Maritime Spatial Unit of the wider North Aegean.
... 3.2 Subsystem analysis and variable selection 3.2.1 Natural subsystem. The natural subsystem contains the basic resources for regional development and plays a central role in maintaining social resilience, enhancing social wellbeing and promoting economic growth and sustainable development (Guerry et al., 2015;Bateman and Mace, 2020;O'Keeffe et al., 2022). The area and yield of crops are the basis for ensuring food security and providing important support for sustainable livelihoods (Leng et al., 2019). ...
Purpose
This study aims to evaluate the characteristics of climate change in Yunnan minority areas and identify an effective path to promote sustainable livelihoods based on climate change.
Design/methodology/approach
Taking Yunnan Province as an example, based on the expansion of the traditional sustainable livelihood framework, the authors constructed a system dynamics (SD) model of sustainable livelihood from the six subsystems of natural, physical, financial, social, human and cultural and tested the accuracy and effectiveness of the model with data from Cangyuan County. By adjusting these parameters, five development paths are designed to simulate the future situation of the livelihood system and determine the optimal path.
Findings
Climate change has exacerbated the vulnerability of people’s livelihoods. In future, each of the five development paths will be advantageous for promoting sustainable livelihoods. However, compared with Path I (maintaining the status quo), Path III (path of giving priority to culture) and Path IV (path of giving priority to economic development) have more obvious advantages. Path II (path of giving priority to people’s lives) gradually increases the development rate by promoting people’s endogenous motivation, and Path V (path of coordinated development) is better than the other paths because of its more balanced consideration.
Originality/value
The analytical framework of sustainable livelihoods based on the characteristics of minority areas is broadened. By constructing a SD model of the livelihood system, the limitations of traditional static analysis have been overcome and a development path for promoting sustainable livelihoods through simulation is proposed. This study offers a theoretical framework and reference method for livelihood research against the backdrop of climate change and a decision-making basis for enhancing climate adaptability and realizing sustainable livelihoods.
... The framework is based on the household's access to livelihood capitals (Cochrane, 2006;Odero, 2008;Wu et al., 2019) and establishes suitable interventions to improve the environmental and economic situation (Zhang et al., 2020a). Although all livelihood capitals are capable of replacement, proponents of the strong sustainability approach believe that natural capital levels must be maintained for a sustainable livelihood (Bateman and Mace, 2020;Ekins et al., 2003). ...
... Natural capital accounting allows tracking the contribution of nature, understood as ecosystems, to human well-being and development, and the positive interactions between society, economy, and environment (Bagstad et al. 2021;Bruzzese et al. 2022;Li et al. 2022). The results obtained from accounting can then be used individually or in an integrated way in complex decision-making processes (Bateman and Mace 2020;Vysna et al. 2021): in economic impact and cost-benefit analyses of planning choices and policy programmes, and to inform governments, institutions, and society about the use of natural resources. ...
Markets for ecosystem services (MES) can play a key role in the protection of natural capital and the remuneration of sustainable management practices. This study aims to present the state of the art on forestry MES at the international level through a systematic review. The main objectives are (i) to analyse the distribution of actual or potential markets for forest ecosystem services (FES) that exist internationally today, (ii) to identify the spatial scale at which market-based instruments (MBIs) are applied and the respective measures of economic value used to assess FES, and (iii) to identify the actors and their involvement in the implementation of forestry MES. The study collected 304 peer-reviewed publications using the Scopus and Web of Science databases. The PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses) protocol was used to guide the systematic process and select the 52 articles analysed in the review. The results show that Europe is the most representative continent in terms of geographical areas involved ( n = 8) by forestry MES, followed by America ( n = 6), Asia ( n = 5), and Africa ( n = 1). The main scale of application of MBIs for forestry MES is local, i.e., at the level of forest stand, municipality, or province ( n = 31), followed by subnational ( n = 10), national ( n = 9), and international ( n = 2). The main pattern of social composition in forestry MES is buyers, sellers, and intermediaries ( n = 25), followed by buyers and sellers only ( n = 12), buyers, sellers, intermediaries, and knowledge providers ( n = 5), and buyers, sellers, and knowledge providers ( n = 3). In terms of the measure of economic value, most studies use willingness to accept ( n = 30), as opposed to willingness to pay ( n = 17), and only 5 studies used both. Future research on forestry MES should be directed towards a better understanding of the process leading to their creation, implementation, effectiveness, governance, and level of satisfaction in economic terms of the actors involved.
... The selection of WPPs is subject to local nuisance and disamenity costs and the cost of carbon emissions due to land-use change, as well as constraints to prevent the loss of W&B. Hence, this type of analysis follows the approach by Bateman and Mace (2020), for example, arguing that a monetary value should not be placed on biodiversity impacts but rather constraints on the loss of critical natural capital for which there is limited substitutability. ...
Energy generated by land-based wind power is expected to play a crucial role in the decarbonisation of the economy. However, with the looming biodiversity and nature crises, spatial allocation of wind power can no longer be considered solely a trade-off against local disamenity costs. Emphasis should also be put on wider environmental impacts, especially if these challenge the sustainability of the renewable energy transition. We suggest a modelling system for selecting among a pool of potential wind power plants (WPPs) by combining an energy system model with a GIS analysis of WPP sites and surrounding viewscapes. The modelling approach integrates monetised local disamenity and carbon sequestration costs and places constraints on areas of importance for wilderness and biodiversity (W&B). Simulating scenarios for the Norwegian energy system towards 2050, we find that the southern part of Norway is the most favourable region for wind power siting when only the energy system surplus is considered. However, when local disamenity costs (and to a lesser extent carbon costs) and W&B constraints are added successively to the scenarios, it becomes increasingly beneficial to site WPPs in the northern part of Norway. We find that the W&B constraints have the largest impact on the spatial distribution of WPPs, while the monetised costs of satisfying these constraints are relatively small. Overall, our results show that there is a trade-off between local disamenities and loss of W&B. Siting wind power plants outside the visual proximity of households has a negative impact on W&B.
... Costanza (2020) emphasised the importance of natural capital for sustaining human life on earth, and argued that valuing natural capital is about assessing its contribution, in complex interaction with built, human, and social capital, towards the goal of sustainable wellbeing of the whole system of humans and the rest of nature, and it is built on the recognition that sustainable wellbeing cannot be achieved without the wellbeing of the rest of nature. Bateman and Mace (2020) acknowledged that the concept of natural capital was gaining traction as recognition grows of the central role of the natural environment in sustaining economic and social wellbeing, and welcomed early indications that a natural capital approach to decision making was being accepted within government policy processes and the private sector. ...
There has been some recent interest in the role that natural capital can play in the transition to a more sustainable hospitality industry. However, little work has been published in the academic literature on the role of natural capital in the hospitality industry and how it can be assessed, and this represents a gap in that literature. With this in mind, this short exploratory paper outlines the origins and definition of natural capital, looks at some of the ways in which the hospitality industry benefits from natural capital, explores the relationship between natural capital and natural asset management, and provides an illustrative cameo case study of how one of the leading companies in the hospitality industry, namely Marriott international, has addressed natural capital in their most recent environmental, social and governance report. The paper concludes that there is, as yet, very limited universal recognition of natural capital as an element of sustainability strategy in the hospitality industry. Indeed, even where it is in evidence, natural capital is still viewed within the idiom of economic growth and the continuing expansion of the hospitality industry. The paper suggests, however, that the adoption and adaptation of asset management practices may provide a more realistic way of assessing and measuring the current and evolving value and condition of natural capital. Keywords: hospitality industry, tourism, natural capital, natural asset management, Marriott International
... For simplicity, this analysis focuses on the six types of ecosystems referenced in de Groot et al.'s (2012) ecosystem service valuation database: inland wetlands, tropical forests, grasslands, woodlands, coastal systems, and marine systems. De Groot et al. 's (2012) database values ecosystems as a form of willingness to pay (WTP) based on the worth of their provision of food and raw materials, their prevention of soil erosion, or their endowment of aesthetic and recreational settings (Bateman & Mace, 2020, 2020de Groot et al., 2012. Hence, the WTP for ecosystem n is used as the index of its shadow price. ...
... At both national and international scales, such data are typically lacking, but are is required to meaningfully upscale epibiotic sediment production rates in a robust manner. Such data could be used to provide evidence to inform accurate natural capital assessments for consideration in decision-making processes in coastal development and marine conservation 41 . Furthermore, in any location with epibiont encrusted seagrasses, associated carbonate sediment production will have the capacity to contribute to building and maintaining adjacent shorelines, and should thus be considered in the context of coastal sediment budgets. ...
The future vulnerability of low-lying atoll nations is inextricably linked to the production of carbonate sediments by organisms living in their adjacent marine environments. Seagrass meadows are commonly found adjacent to reef islands, but their role as sources of reef island-building sediments has been overlooked. Here, we combine field, satellite and sedimentological data to quantify rates of sediment production by seagrass epibionts in a reef island sediment supply context. Total seagrass epibiont sediment production at our study site (Huvadhoo Atoll, Maldives) was 853,000 ± 90,000 kg CaCO3 yr⁻¹ over an area of 1.1 km². Of this total sediment production, 541,000 ± 23,000 kg CaCO3 yr⁻¹ was estimated to be suitable to contribute to reef island building (sand-sized, post-agitation). Our findings highlight a valuable ecosystem service provided by tropical seagrass meadows as important potential sources of reef island-building sediment. This study, therefore, presents a compelling geomorphic argument for seagrass conservation.
... Conservation of biodiversity is a global imperative but achieving this is an elusive endeavor (IPBES, 2019). Essential to achieving conservation of biodiversity is to have integrated environmental and economic information to enable better trade-offs between human and natural values (e.g., Bateman & Mace, 2020;Bull et al., 2020;Cardinale et al., 2012;Dasgupta, 2008). Environmental and ecosystem accounting is one way of achieving this (Hein et al., 2020). ...
Biodiversity accounting is promoted as a way of improving the conservation of species and ecosystems. Advancing the theory and practice of biodiversity accounting is driven by the United Nation's standardization of ecosystem accounting in 2021 and a desire to make production of ecosystem accounts commonplace and useful. While the theory of biodiversity accounting has advanced, in practice few accounts have been produced and all have focused on iconic or threatened species. We present a set of novel biodiversity accounts for the 92 butterfly species of the Australian Capital Territory (ACT), spanning 1978–2021, using historical records and systematic surveys of 224 sites between 2014–15 and 2020–21 in the Southern Hemisphere survey season (Spring‐Autum). We conclude that species level biodiversity accounting is useful for biodiversity conservation and that species accounting must go beyond accounting for iconic and threatened species and reflect other characteristics, such as the distribution, abundance, residential status, breeding status, endemism, and ecological status of all species. Habitat specialization provides a link to ecosystem condition accounting, with changes in the distribution and abundance of habitat specialists a likely indicator of ecosystem condition. With such information, species accounts can be used to assess and target conservation activity and examples for ACT butterflies are provided. Biodiversity accounting is a way of organizing information to improve the conservation of species and ecosystems. We present butterfly accounts for the Australian Capital Territory, Australia, covering 92 species and spanning the years 1978–2021. We conclude that to be useful for biodiversity conservation, biodiversity accounting must the reflect the distribution, abundance, residence, breeding status, endemism, and habitat specialization of all species, and not just iconic or endangered species.
... Demonstrating the benefits of strengthened PAs to people is a likely prerequisite for societal support to maintain and improve upon the existing network while mitigating the risk of future downgrading, downsizing, or degazettement (legal removal of conservation status) (119). Financial benefits that come with strengthened PAs must be distributed appropriately and equitably within the country's political and social contexts, with the full inclusion of local communities at all stages (118,120). ...
Madagascar's unique biota is heavily affected by human activity and is under intense threat. Here, we review the current state of knowledge on the conservation status of Madagascar's terrestrial and freshwater biodiversity by presenting data and analyses on documented and predicted species-level conservation statuses, the most prevalent and relevant threats, ex situ collections and programs, and the coverage and comprehensiveness of protected areas. The existing terrestrial protected area network in Madagascar covers 10.4% of its land area and includes at least part of the range of the majority of described native species of vertebrates with known distributions (97.1% of freshwater fishes, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals combined) and plants (67.7%). The overall figures are higher for threatened species (97.7% of threatened vertebrates and 79.6% of threatened plants occurring within at least one protected area). International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List assessments and Bayesian neural network analyses for plants identify overexploitation of biological resources and unsustainable agriculture as the most prominent threats to biodiversity. We highlight five opportunities for action at multiple levels to ensure that conservation and ecological restoration objectives, programs, and activities take account of complex underlying and interacting factors and produce tangible benefits for the biodiversity and people of Madagascar.
... Existing institutions reveal the history and path-dependency of the forces that shaped them, as well as the modifications and adaptations that they accumulated over time (Bateman & Mace, 2020;Baumol et al., 1988;Freeman III et al., 2014). For example, the Aichi targets represent institutional history. ...
This is the final text version of Chapter 4. A laid-out version of the full assessment report will be made available in the coming months.
... This requires us to care about the growth and distribution of ESs just as we used to care about economic wealth. After entering the Anthropocene, nature was no longer as endless as we thought but deeply influenced by human activities ( Bateman and Mace, 2020 ). We must understand and control our impact on the natural environment and ensure our activities are within a tolerable level for the earth's ecosystem ( Leach et al., 2013 ) to ensure that we can coexist harmoniously with the ecosystem for continuous benefits brought by the ESs chain. ...
Recent centuries have witnessed a considerable economic growth, but have also been accompanied by ecological deterioration which has led to the utility decline in every hard-won material wealth. Here we proposed a comprehensive framework for detecting these economic growth expenses, combining the ecosystem services chain with ecological economics principles. Remote sensing products, biophysical process modeling, and inferential geostatistics were comprehensively used in tracing the quantity and quality of natural capital, the total amount, and the fairness of human well-being in both ecological and economic aspects in the last two decades of China. We find that although the natural capital condition and ecosystem services in most parts of China are rising, they are declining in the most economically developed regions where the vast majority of the people lives. Furthermore, this decline is unequal, affecting different people due to the spatial mismatch between population and ecological services. Further promoting China's environment-friendly industrial system and the transaction of ecological products may help alleviate the decline and inequity of ecological well-being. This framework aims to provide an interdisciplinary dashboard to help identify and deal with risks on our way to prosperity for regions either within or beyond China.
... The main goal of ecological sustainability is related to the integrity of the environmental concept (Marques 2009). Natural ecosystems sustainability is a significant prerequisite and a durable approach for urban sustainable development accomplishment (Bateman et al. 2020). ...
The environmental fragility of cities and advanced urbanization has motivated
extensive efforts to promote the sustainability of urban ecosystems. In this study, the most affecting factors for the ecological sustainability of the cities that can be achieved by UGS planning and design will be
discussed, and the most important and key factors will be presented based on
an international survey drown by international UGS experts and academicians.
... This is basically consistent with the concept of ecological assets, which is widely used in the research of Chinese scholars [3][4][5][6][7]. The earliest concept related to ecosystem assets in the world is natural capital [8], including renewable and non-renewable natural resources (such as plants, animals, air, water, soils, energy, and minerals) [1, 9,10]. Ecosystem assets are an important part of natural capital [11] and are the material basis of ecosystem service functions and ecosystem service values, which are directly related to the well-being of human society and can be measured by area and quality [2,12]. ...
Land urbanization has reduced the amount of area for natural ecosystem assets. However, with the development of the social economy, will the quality of natural ecosystem assets be improved? If one comprehensively considers the changes in the area and quality of natural ecosystem assets, is the dominant impact of urbanization on natural ecosystem assets positive or negative? In this study, detailed research is conducted on the area, pattern, quality, and overall situation of the ecosystem assets in the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei urban agglomeration during the rapid urbanization process. The impact of urbanization on the overall situation of ecosystem assets is also analyzed. The research methods used to generate statistics, accounting, and analysis of the ecosystem assets include ArcGIS, satellite remote sensing images, R language programming, and other data analysis tools. The research results show that: (1) The ecosystem area was dominated by degradation, and the landscape pattern became increasingly fragmented, with the exception of farmland and wetland areas. (2) However, the quality of the natural ecosystem assets was significantly improved, and the overall situation of the natural ecosystem assets was optimized. (3) In addition to the population urbanization rate, the growth in the population density, land urbanization rate, and GDP per unit area had a significant negative impact on the overall situation of natural ecosystem assets. This reminds people that the improvement in asset quality can compensate for the reduction in area to some extent, and, in addition to the population urbanization rate, the levels of population density, land urbanization, and economic density should be appropriately controlled.
... To conclude, the concept of sustainability is widely acknowledged and embedded in frameworks within the natural capital context, and there is a clear onus on ensuring stocks are maintained above potential tipping point levels. This recognition was not easily won, however, and the natural capital approach saw many of the same theoretical challenges that are currently faced by the CHC (Bateman & Mace, 2020). The ecosystem services sector has also established the idea of 'rules': red lines beyond which habitat or biodiversity loss will be a clear negative, in the absence of the use of natural capital accounting frameworks. ...
The Scoping Culture and Heritage Capital study was commissioned jointly in November 2021 by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS).
The study was led by Dr Patrycja Kaszynska, Senior Research Fellow at UAL , in partnership with cultural sector partners and policy makers, and collaborating with a team of researchers spanning arts and humanities, heritage science and economics: Dr Sadie Watson and Dr Emma Dwyer from Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA); Prof Diane Coyle, University of Cambridge; Prof Patrizia Riganti and Dr Yang Wang University of Glasgow, Dr Ricky Lawton, Simetrica-Jacobs and Dr Mafalda Dâmaso (UAL).
The findings of the scoping study are that the introduction of the CHC framework presents significant opportunities from the point of view of valuing the arts, culture and heritage, as well as policy decision-making as such. However, the scoping exercise shows that developing, operationalising and implementing this framework requires sustained research attention, methods refinement and, crucially, capacity- and capability-building across disciplines and sectors. This is not least because the value of arts, culture and heritage as conceived through the CHC framework is an inter- and trans-disciplinary concept.
The scoping study is accompanied by a AHRC/DCMS funding call for new research informed by the project’s recommendations.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/scoping-culture-and-heritage-capital-report
... Other outputs of the land include ecosystem services, which play an important role in the production of agricultural commodities. Ecosystem services (as defined by Smith et al., 2017) are the flows (material and immaterial) generated by the stocks of natural capital or resources through action by people (Bateman & Mace, 2020). Negative impacts T A B L E 1 Wellbeing dimensions based on Schaafsma and Gross-Camp (2021) ...
While international trade in agricultural commodities can spur economic development especially where governance is strong, there are also concerns about the local impacts of commodity production and their distribution. Previous frameworks have primarily focused on trade effects on environmental conditions in production regions, as well as economic growth and food security. Instead, we develop a conceptual framework for understanding the impact of agricultural trade on multidimensional wellbeing and equity. The purpose of the framework is to guide the analysis of the impacts of trade on people, by identifying the core concepts and organising the complexity of the local social impacts of global value chains. The framework is supported by evidence from studies on trade in soy, coffee, cocoa, and palm oil.
... Natural capital is a term commonly used and is defined by Bateman and Mace (2020) as ''those renewable and non-renewable natural resources (such as air, water, soils, and energy), stocks of which can benefit people both directly (for example, by delivering clean air) and indirectly (for example, by underpinning the economy)''. Biodiversity (genes, species and ecosystems) are a part of natural resources although they are not separately identified in the examples of this definition. ...
The COVID-19 pandemic and related social and economic emergencies induced massive public spending and increased global debt. Economic recovery is now an opportunity to rebuild natural capital alongside financial, physical, social and human capital, for long-term societal benefit. Yet, current decision-making is dominated by economic imperatives and information systems that do not consider society's dependence on natural capital and the ecosystem services it provides. New international standards for natural capital accounting (NCA) are now available to integrate environmental information into government decision-making. By revealing the effects of policies that influence natural capital, NCA supports identification, implementation and monitoring of Green Recovery pathways, including where environment and economy are most positively interlinked.
... While the costs of environmental protection are relatively easy to quantify, the benefits are often less obvious and much more difficult to take into account 2,3 . Measuring the values of environmental benefits therefore offers an important counterweight to the costs that would otherwise dominate any decision-making process 4 . To better inform individuals and policymakers on how much they should protect the environment, considerable effort has been made over the past several decades to properly value the environment 5,6 . ...
One of the key obstacles to building public consensus regarding environmental problems is the fact that environmental benefits are valued differently by different individuals and across different regions. Lack of public consensus has fractured international and domestic agreements, preventing effective system implementation. However, where does the disparity come from? Here, we provide evidence that can help to understand such diversity by analysing large-scale survey data collected across G20 countries. Combining lifecycle impact assessment and economic valuation techniques, our analysis shows that people’s perceptions of environmental benefits are in fact diverse, but are determined by a few social indicators such as life expectancy, income and gender equality, as well as individual conditions such as relative income and subjective well-being. As these social- and individual-level conditions improve, people shift priorities and place more emphasis on less tangible environmental benefits (biodiversity conservation) rather than relatively tangible (health-related) ones. Focusing on such determinants and addressing the problems of inequality and well-being are critical to building public consensus and tackling global environmental issues practically. Our findings can illuminate a feasible step to global consensus and a sustainable society.
Although greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and marine plastic reduction have been recognised as essential factors for the sustainability performance of waste-to-energy (WTE) facilities, there is a lack of comprehensive evaluation tool for quantifying the environmental, social and economic impacts caused by WTE projects. To fill the gap, this study developed a natural capital-based sustainability assessment (NCSA) framework for evaluating the sustainability of WTE projects. The merits of the NCSA framework include (1) the quantification of the benefits caused by the avoidance of marine plastic pollution by WTE projects, and (2) an inclusive sustainability evaluation framework that holistically assesses the environmental, social and economic performance associated with GHG and marine plastic reduction. The NCSA framework has been demonstrated in the case study on the Sanya WTE Project. The results showed that the Sanya WTE Project emitted 265,376 tonnes of CO2e of GHG and prevented 28,242 - 75,312 tonnes of marine plastic during the study period, which is equivalent to a net benefit of CNY41.90 million - 464.45 million. The case study demonstrated that the NCSA framework is a comprehensive evaluation tool that provides clear and sound results for guiding decisions towards sustainable waste management and the overall sustainability of cities.
The impact of blue and green spaces on wellbeing has been universally acknowledged. However, the meaning of “wellbeing” differs depending on the lens through which it is viewed. The current review of reviews considers the impact of blue and green spaces from the positive psychology perspective, which focuses on the gains in psychological outcomes (e.g., optimism, positive affect) instead of a reduction in deficits (e.g., depression, anxiety). Of the 149 systematic review and meta-analysis papers, 17 were included in the current review of reviews. The results highlighted the scarcity of systematic reviews that assess the positive outcomes of blue and green spaces and moderating factors associated with them. The existing systematic reviews identified inconsistent wellbeing frameworks, focused primarily on positive affect as an outcome of engaging in nature and disregarded eudaimonic aspects of wellbeing. Limitations of the current systematic reviews and future directions are discussed along with the implications for practice.
Increasing tree planting on farms can provide a range of benefits. However, there are many barriers to increasing plantings on farms. To answer the research question of how natural capital accounting might be used to support farmers to increase trees on their farms, we spoke to 22 decision makers and stakeholders who are working to increase tree planting in different sectors. We also worked with farmers to plant over 200 ha of trees. The interview results show how tree planting programs can be supported to achieve longer-term, on-farm and social outcomes. The practical results highlight the importance of tailoring different strategies to different objectives. We find that natural capital accounting is a potential way to create partnerships across government and non-governmental organisations beyond the farm gate and to align individual and national scale objectives. Increasing trees on farms is not just about farmers, all of society has a role to play. We also note the need to raise public awareness of the different flow-on benefits of increasing natural capital on farms.
The growing demands of satisfying human well-being call for a sustainable way of managing the landscape, which requires the introduction of tools for evaluating and assessing ecosystem services. The aim of the study is to evaluate regional differentiations in the values of regulating ecosystem services in relation to natural potential in four small pilot regions of the Slovak Republic with the application of the modified matrix approach. The results in the pilot regions of the Slovak Republic indicated that the spatial distribution of individual ecosystems in the country, in combination with a higher altitude and a larger area of forests and protected areas, can represent significant factors influencing the potential of the territory to provide benefits resulting from regulating ecosystem services. Mountain areas generally have a higher capacity to provide regulating ecosystem services, mainly due to their rich forest vegetation. Regulating ecosystem services, to the greatest extent, reflects the multifunctionality of the territory.
Woonopgave, waterveiligheid, duurzame voedselvoorziening, biodiversiteitsherstel, klimaat- en energietransitie, …: het zijn allemaal brandende vraagstukken die zonder voldoende ruimte niet opgelost kunnen worden. Niet verwonderlijk daarom dat veel van deze grote kwesties samenkomen op het platteland. Het maakt dat het platteland steeds meer verstrengeld en vervlochten raakt, en het praktisch onmogelijk wordt de maatschappelijke opgaven afzonderlijk van elkaar op te lossen. Wat doet dit met de ruimtelijke inrichting van het platteland? Bij de officiële aanvaarding van zijn bijzondere leerstoel ‘Natuurinclusieve Plattelandsontwikkeling’ gaat hoogleraar Martijn van der Heide in op deze actuele vraag. Specifieke aandacht gaat daarbij uit naar de ruimtelijke inpassing van natuurcombinaties, waarbij natuur wordt verbonden met andere maatschappelijke opgaven. Dus niet louter het afschermen van natuur in Natura 2000-gebieden, maar juist óók het duurzaam gebruiken van natuur om deze grote opgaven te realiseren. Dat laatste betekent dat je niet in monocausale ketens kunt blijven denken, maar dat een geïntegreerde aanpak cruciaal is. Bijvoorbeeld met ecologisch-economische analyses die de meerwaarde van natuurinclusiviteit inzichtelijk maken. Vergroten natuurcombinaties de brede welvaart in een regio? Tegelijkertijd: de toekomst van natuurinclusieve plattelandsontwikkeling ligt niet louter en alleen in deze en andere cijfermatige analyses. Want wil je mensen verbinden, en tot actie bewegen, wil je een doorbraak realiseren in de besluitvorming, dan heb je een gemeenschappelijk verhaal nodig. Wat is dit verhaal over een natuurinclusief platteland? Een urgente, maar lastige vraag met alle boerenonrust op het platteland die een hang naar het ‘eigene’ versterkt, en tot regionalisme kan leiden. Hoe is tegen zo’n decor een natuurinclusief verhaal te maken, dat belanghebbenden verbindt en in beweging brengt?
The economics of biodiversity is gaining traction and with it the economic valuation of ecosystem services (ESS). Most current developments neglect microbial diversity, although microbial communities provide ecosystem services of great importance. Here we argue that microbial biodiversity (hereafter microbiodiversity) translates into considerable economic value which is usually not explicitly included in quantitative valuation of ecological functions to date. This omission may result in inaccurate values, potentially entailing substantial economic losses, both in private and in public decision-making, due to external effects that arise as microbiodiversity is horizontally and vertically transferred between hosts and natural environments. Microbiodiversity, an important part of biodiversity in general, occupies an irreplaceable position as a natural resource in ecosystems, because of option values derived from the evolutionary potential of microbes, especially if host-associated, and also because of their additional insurance value within changing environments. We illustrate our arguments with specific examples (microbiomes associated with humans, soil, and corals), all of which are jeopardized through anthropogenic pressure. We conclude that the consideration of microbiodiversity in economic valuation will help to find essential assets and guide decision-makers to conserve and protect the economic value of highly diverse microbial communities for future generations.
In this conceptual paper, we examine current theories of natural capital approach implementation and identify areas where further research is needed to help humanity live within planetary boundaries. Natural capital and ecosystem service approaches offer an advanced understanding of Earth's life‐support systems and their interaction with human well‐being at multiple scales, particularly organizations. The insights they offer are present in conservation and accounting literature but are not yet reflected in corporate environmental sustainability literature, a gap this paper seeks to bridge. Without considering scale, it is difficult to understand how micro (individual) and meso (organizational or national) actions contribute to global goals (planetary boundaries). We suggest a multi‐level natural capital implementation framework for corporate environmental sustainability and explain how it can advance natural capital implementation by including scoping and monitoring phases and increasing awareness of natural resource dependencies and how it advances multi‐level environmental management theory.
Außergewöhnliche Wetterphänomene wie die Hitzesommer 2018 und 2019 in nördlichen und mittleren Teilen Europas, die Flutkatastrophe im Sommer 2021 in Nordrhein-Westfalen und Rheinland-Pfalz sowie verheerende Wald- und Buschbrände wie in Australien, Kalifornien oder in Mittelmeer-Anrainerstaaten finden einen breiten Widerhall in den Medien und im alltäglichen Erzählen. Fragen des Klimawandels sind daher längst nicht mehr auf den akademischen Bereich beschränkt, sondern werden mittlerweile auch in breiten Schichten der Bevölkerung diskutiert. Dabei werden mitunter heftige Emotionen hervorgerufen, von denen die Angst bzw. Zukunftsangst im Zentrum dieses interdisziplinär angelegten Sammelbandes steht.
Ecosystem service (ES) and natural capital (NC) concepts have been promoted as influential tools for environmental management within national public policy. To achieve this potential, these concepts must transition across the science-policy interface and become integrated within governance systems. This study examines 25-years of ES and NC concepts within national public policy at two levels: explicit use of terminology, and implicit description of services. Using the case-study of Ireland as a country with significant bio-based industry and dependence on its NC, we ask when, where, and what conceptual integration has occurred within the national policy landscape. Data were collected using mixed-methods content analysis applied to 50 Irish policy and reporting documents spanning 1996-2020. Results showed i) conceptual integration began in 2008; ii) explicit use of ES was more common than NC (442 compared to 92 uses); iii) explicit use disproportionately occurred within biodiversity policy and environmental reports; iv) use of explicit terminology contained interdisciplinary themes; v) implicit descriptions of ESs differed between policy types; vi) cultural service descriptions were identified throughout the sample whereas regulating services were more visible in more recent documents. Overall conceptual integration was found to be present but fragmented, which may create a barrier to achieving a policy landscape that is responsive to emerging ES science. Conceptual integration is dependent on the broader environmental and governance context and further research is required to understand how this impacts downstream implementation and operation. We conclude by commenting on the implications for future conceptual integration and environmental policy development.
Degradation of agricultural and forest lands is a global problem causing climate change, loss of biodiversity, ecosystem services, and environmental hazards. In the red and lateritic soils of the northeast, central and southern India, land degradation remains a major problem affecting the lives of millions of people. Agroforestry systems with appropriate combinations of arable crops, horticultural trees, and forest tree species are suggested as effective strategies to combat land degradation by restoring biodiversity and ecosystem services but the scientific evidence is lacking for red and lateritic soils of northeast India. In response, a forest deciduous tree species Gmelina [Gmelina arborea Roxb.], a fruit tree mango [Mangifera indica L.], and a legume crop pigeon pea [Cajanus cajan (L.) Millsp.] were grown solely or in various combinations for ten years (July 2009 to June 2019) in the red and lateritic soil of West Bengal, India to evaluate their role in the restoration of degraded land and the potential for offering multiple ecosystems services. Eleven indicators were selected for evaluating the multifunctionality of ecosystem services having synergies between them. Results after ten years of field experiments revealed that the Gmelina-mango-pigeon pea agroforestry system has provided multiple ecosystem goods like edible seeds (pigeon pea), fruits (mango), fuelwood and timber (mango/Gmelina) sequentially, and was 2–3 times more profitable in terms of net present value compared to sole Gmelina or mango or pigeon pea. This system also offered greater climate resiliency with 1–2 times higher annual biomass production, thus offsetting greenhouse gases emission. The composite evaluation index demonstrated that this system offers the highest level of multifunctionality of multiple ecosystem services. Evidence from this long-term experimentation suggests that the crop-fruit tree-forest tree-based agroforestry system has the potential to restore the land productivity of the degraded red and lateritic soils and provide multiple ecosystem services to millions of people dependent on such land. This system could potentially be out-scaled in many other similar agroecological zones of the world.
Climate change is expected to impact agricultural land use. Steadily accumulating changes in temperature and water availability can alter the relative profitability of different farming activities and promote land-use changes. There is also potential for high-impact ‘climate tipping points’, where abrupt, nonlinear change in climate occurs, such as the potential collapse of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). Here, using data from Great Britain, we develop a methodology to analyse the impacts of a climate tipping point on land use and economic outcomes for agriculture. We show that economic and land-use impacts of such a tipping point are likely to include widespread cessation of arable farming with losses of agricultural output that are an order of magnitude larger than the impacts of climate change without an AMOC collapse. The agricultural effects of AMOC collapse could be ameliorated by technological adaptations such as widespread irrigation, but the amount of water required and the costs appear to be prohibitive in this instance. Collapse of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) will impact agricultural land use and its economic value in Great Britain. Ritchie et al. model the impacts of smooth (conventional climate change) and abrupt (tipping point change) AMOC collapse on land use, arable farming and related economic outputs in Britain, as well as the economic feasibility of technological adaptations such as widespread irrigation.
Research and interest into natural capital, i.e., the stock of the world's natural resources, is increasing as it links humans with nature within a social-ecological system, contributing to ecosystem sustainability. We collected publication data for 300 natural capital papers to explore academic networks and research trends. We used Twitter to collect 14,193 tweets about natural capital over nine months. Analyzing publication data shows three main research clusters, but few coauthorships between the clusters. The results show substantial international coauthorships, and the dominance of American and British academics as coauthors. Analyzing Twitter data, we identified a small community of key users that tweet about natural capital frequently. We found that a range of words is used in tweets about natural capital and the overall sentiment of tweets is positive. For both types of data, "ecosystem services" and "biodiversity" are keywords associated with natural capital. Our results have identified key communities of natural capital researchers, but highlight a potential disconnect between research clusters that needs to be addressed. Current communities surrounding natural capital in academia and on Twitter are relatively exclusive and small.
There is growing concern over tipping points arising in ecosystems because of the crossing of environmental thresholds. Tipping points lead to abrupt and possibly irreversible shifts between alternative ecosystem states, potentially incurring high societal costs. Trait variation in populations is central to the biotic feedbacks that maintain alternative ecosystem states, as they govern the responses of populations to environmental change that could stabilize or destabilize ecosystem states. However, we know little about how evolutionary changes in trait distributions over time affect the occurrence of tipping points and even less about how big-scale ecological shifts reciprocally interact with trait dynamics. We argue that interactions between ecological and evolutionary processes should be taken into account in order to understand the balance of feedbacks governing tipping points in nature.
Approximately 25 years ago, ecologists became increasingly interested in the question of whether ongoing biodiversity loss matters for the functioning of ecosystems. As such, a new ecological subfield on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning (BEF) was born. This subfield was initially dominated by theoretical studies and by experiments in which biodiversity was manipulated, and responses of ecosystem functions such as biomass production, decomposition rates, carbon sequestration, trophic interactions and pollination were assessed. More recently, an increasing number of studies have investigated BEF relationships in non‐manipulated ecosystems, but reviews synthesizing our knowledge on the importance of real‐world biodiversity are still largely missing.
I performed a systematic review in order to assess how biodiversity drives ecosystem functioning in both terrestrial and aquatic, naturally assembled communities, and on how important biodiversity is compared to other factors, including other aspects of community composition and abiotic conditions. The outcomes of 258 published studies, which reported 726 BEF relationships, revealed that in many cases, biodiversity promotes average biomass production and its temporal stability, and pollination success. For decomposition rates and ecosystem multifunctionality, positive effects of biodiversity outnumbered negative effects, but neutral relationships were even more common. Similarly, negative effects of prey biodiversity on pathogen and herbivore damage outnumbered positive effects, but were less common than neutral relationships. Finally, there was no evidence that biodiversity is related to soil carbon storage.
Most BEF studies focused on the effects of taxonomic diversity, however, metrics of functional diversity were generally stronger predictors of ecosystem functioning. Furthermore, in most studies, abiotic factors and functional composition (e.g. the presence of a certain functional group) were stronger drivers of ecosystem functioning than biodiversity per se. While experiments suggest that positive biodiversity effects become stronger at larger spatial scales, in naturally assembled communities this idea is too poorly studied to draw general conclusions.
In summary, a high biodiversity in naturally assembled communities positively drives various ecosystem functions. At the same time, the strength and direction of these effects vary highly among studies, and factors other than biodiversity can be even more important in driving ecosystem functioning. Thus, to promote those ecosystem functions that underpin human well‐being, conservation should not only promote biodiversity per se, but also the abiotic conditions favouring species with suitable trait combinations.
These guidelines have been produced to support the development of ecosystem service
indicators at the national and regional level for uses in reporting, assessments, policy
making, biodiversity conservation, ecosystem management, environmental management,
development planning and education.
The guidance contains four key sections:
1. Introduction to ecosystem service indicators
2. Steps in developing ecosystem service
indicators
3. Mainstreaming ecosystem service indicators
4. Ecosystem indicators developed and piloted in
South Africa
Recent years have seen a surge of interest in ecosystem multifunctionality, a concept that has developed in the largely separate fields of biodiversity–ecosystem function and land management research. Here we discuss the merit of the multifunctionality concept, the advances it has delivered, the challenges it faces and solutions to these challenges. This involves the redefinition of multifunctionality as a property that exists at two levels: ecosystem function multifunctionality and ecosystem service multifunctionality. The framework presented provides a road map for the development of multifunctionality measures that are robust, quantifiable and relevant to both fundamental ecological science and ecosystem management.
A rights-based approach to the environmental issues has been gaining momentum since the United Nations’ Environmental Agency proposed a new rights-based agenda for sustainable development in the document, Transforming our world: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (UN, 2015). Our moral responsibility toward the environment is essential to the project of sustainable development. The Kantian ethical tradition lays the foundations of a rights-based approach to human rights and sustainable development. Human rights are essential to the flourishing of all human beings regardless of their nationality or another status. Linking human rights to environmental justice has been an arduous task, but contemporary environmental ethicists argue that giving a human face to the environment that nurtures and sustains us is a precondition for sustainable development. The concept of sustainability addresses the issue of economic growth at present and how this impacts the future generations. This paper examines the rights-based environmental ethics, which has emerged in the context of a human rights-based approach to human development and forges a link between rights-based ethics and sustainable development that could establish a solid foundation for environmental justice.
The connected nature of social-ecological systems has never been more apparent than in today's globalized world. The ecosystem service framework and associated ecosystem assessments aim to better inform the science-policy response to sustainability challenges. Such assessments, however, often overlook distant, diffuse and delayed impacts that are critical for global sustainability. Ecosystem-services science must better recognise the off-stage impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem services of place-based ecosystem management, which we term 'ecosystem service burdens'. These are particularly important since they are often negative, and have a potentially significant effect on ecosystem management decisions. Ecosystem-services research can better recognise these off-stage burdens through integration with other analytical approaches, such as life cycle analysis and risk-based approaches that better account for the uncertainties involved. We argue that off-stage ecosystem service burdens should be incorporated in ecosystem assessments such as those led by the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Taking better account of these off-stage burdens is essential to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of cross-scale interactions, a pre-requisite for any sustainability transition.
Significance
Ecosystems store vast quantities of wealth, but difficulties measuring wealth held in ecosystems prevent its inclusion in accounting systems. Ecosystem-based management endeavors to manage ecosystems holistically. However, ecosystem-based management lacks headline indicators to evaluate performance. We unify the inclusive wealth and ecosystem-based management paradigms, allowing apples-to-apples comparisons between the wealth of the ecosystem and other forms of wealth, while providing a headline performance index for evaluating the performance of ecosystem-based management. We project that the Baltic Sea fishery ecosystem yields increasing stores of wealth over the next 50 y under the ecosystem-based management-inspired multispecies maximum sustainable yield management beginning in 2017, whereas the previous single-species management generally results in declining wealth.
The connected nature of social-ecological systems has never been more apparent than in today’s globalized world. The ecosystem service framework and associated ecosystem assessments aim to better inform the science–policy response to sustainability challenges. Such assessments, however, often overlook distant, diffuse and delayed impacts that are critical for global sustainability. Ecosystem-services science must better recognise the off-stage impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem services of place-based ecosystem management, which we term ‘ecosystem service burdens’. These are particularly important since they are often negative, and have a potentially significant effect on ecosystem management decisions. Ecosystem-services research can better recognise these off-stage burdens through integration with other analytical approaches, such as life cycle analysis and risk-based approaches that better account for the uncertainties involved. We argue that off-stage ecosystem service burdens should be incorporated in ecosystem assessments such as those led by the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Taking better account of these off-stage burdens is essential to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of cross-scale interactions, a pre-requisite for any sustainability transition.
Ecosystems are self-regulating systems that provide societies with food, water, timber, and other resources. As demands for resources increase, management decisions are replacing self-regulating properties. Counter to previous technical approaches that applied simple formulas to estimate sustainable yields of single species, current research recognizes the inherent complexity of ecosystems and the inability to foresee all consequences of interventions across different spatial, temporal, and administrative scales. Ecosystem management is thus more realistically seen as a “wicked problem” that has no clear-cut solution. Approaches for addressing such problems include multisector decision-making, institutions that enable management to span across administrative boundaries, adaptive management, markets that incorporate natural capital, and collaborative processes to engage diverse stakeholders and address inequalities. Ecosystem management must avoid two traps: falsely assuming a tame solution and inaction from overwhelming complexity. An incremental approach can help to avoid these traps.
This paper examines the pivotal role played by property markets in determining the magnitude and distribution of welfare changes resulting from localised environmental change. We address that issue using an equilibrium sorting model (ESM) calibrated, by way of example, to the circumstances of a road infrastructure project in the English town of Polegate. Previous ESM research has tended to assume that all households rent property from a fixed property stock. The narrative that arises from those models concerns environmental gentrification, wherein access to environmentally improved locations is appropriated by the relatively wealthy through their ability to out-compete the less wealthy in the rental property market. Our research shows that to be only part of a much more complex story. We develop a model that extends the sophistication with which ESMs replicate property market dynamics, allowing for households to choose whether to rent or purchase their home and introducing greater realism into housing supply responses to changing market conditions. Our research shows that property markets redistribute welfare gains across the population in complex ways in which tenure choice and housing supply constraints play central roles.
In this paper, we reflect on the implications for science, policy and practice of the recently introduced concept of Nature-Based Solutions (NBS), with a focus on the European context. First, we analyse NBS in relation to similar concepts, and reflect on its relationship to sustainability as an overarching framework. From this, we derive a set of questions to be addressed and propose a general framework for how these might be addressed in NBS projects by funders, researchers, policy-makers and practitioners. We conclude that:
The fossil fuel-driven transport sector has been one of the major contributors to CO2 emission across the world keeping it on the energy policy agenda for the past three decades. Canada ranks second in gasoline consumption among OECD countries and Canadian gasoline expenditure share has been increasing since the 1990s. Fuel efficiency policies aim to decrease gasoline consumption; however, the effect can be mitigated by changes in consumer behavior such as traveling more distances — a rebound effect. Thus, the effectiveness of fuel efficiency policy is dependent on the magnitude of the rebound effect. In this paper, we estimate the rebound effect for personal transportation in Canada using data from the household spending survey for the period 1997–2009. The model includes a system of expenditure share equations for gasoline, other energy goods, and non-energy goods specified by AIDS and QUAIDS models and estimated by the nonlinear SUR method. Our estimation results show a rather high average rebound effect of 82–88% but with significant heterogeneity across income groups, provinces, and gasoline prices. Specifically, the rebound effect ranges from 63 to 96% across income groups and provinces and increases with gasoline prices.
National ecosystem assessments form an essential knowledge base for safeguarding biodiversity and ecosystem services. We analyze eight European (sub-)national ecosystem assessments () and compare their objectives, political context, methods, and operationalization. We observed remarkable differences in breadth of the assessment, methods employed, variety of services considered, policy mandates, and funding mechanisms. Biodiversity and ecosystem services are mainly assessed independently, with biodiversity conceptualized as underpinning services, as a source of conflict with services, or as a service in itself. Recommendations derived from our analysis for future ecosystem assessments include the needs to improve the common evidence base, to advance the mapping of services, to consider international flows of services, and to connect more strongly to policy questions. Although the context specificity of national ecosystem assessments is acknowledged as important, a greater harmonization across assessments could help to better inform common European policies and future pan-regional assessments.
Valuing natural capital is fundamental to measuring sustainability. The United Nations Environment Programme, World Bank, and other agencies have called for inclusion of the value of natural capital in sustainability metrics, such as inclusive wealth. Much has been written about the importance of natural capital, but consistent, rigorous valuation approaches compatible with the pricing of traditional forms of capital have remained elusive. We present a guiding quantitative framework enabling natural capital valuation that is fully consistent with capital theory, accounts for biophysical and economic feedbacks, and can guide interdisciplinary efforts to measure sustainability. We illustrate this framework with an application to groundwater in the Kansas High Plains Aquifer, a rapidly depleting asset supporting significant food production. We develop a 10-y time series (1996−2005) of natural capital asset prices that accounts for technological, institutional, and physical changes. Kansas lost approximately $110 million per year (2005 US dollars) of capital value through groundwater withdrawal and changes in aquifer management during the decade spanning 1996–2005. This annual loss in wealth is approximately equal to the state’s 2005 budget surplus, and is substantially more than investments in schools over this period. Furthermore, real investment in agricultural capital also declined over this period. Although Kansas’ depletion of water wealth is substantial, it may be tractably managed through careful groundwater management and compensating investments in other natural and traditional assets. Measurement of natural capital value is required to inform management and ongoing investments in natural assets.
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2016/02/04/1513779113.abstract
Greenhouse gas emissions from global agriculture are
increasing at around 1% per annum, yet substantial cuts in
emissions are needed across all sectors. The challenge of
reducing agricultural emissions is particularly acute, because
the reductions achievable by changing farming practices are
limited,3 and are hampered by rapidly rising food demand,5.
Here we assess the technical mitigation potential off�ered
by land sparing—increasing agricultural yields, reducing
farmland area and actively restoring natural habitats on the
land spared. Restored habitats can sequester carbon and can
o�set emissions from agriculture. Using the UK as an example,
we estimate net emissions in 2050 under a range of future
agricultural scenarios. We find that a land-sparing strategy
has the technical potential to achieve significant reductions in
net emissions from agriculture and land-use change. Coupling
land sparing with demand-side strategies to reduce meat
consumption and food waste can further increase the technical
mitigation potential—however, economic and implementation
considerations might limit the degree to which this technical
potential could be realized in practice.
Assessing the cultural benefits provided by non-market ecosystem services can contribute previously unknown information to supplement conservation decision-making. The concept of sense of place embeds all dimensions of peoples’ perceptions and interpretations of the environment, such as attachment, identity or symbolic meaning, and has the potential to link social and ecological issues. This review contains: (1) an evaluation of the importance of sense of place as an ecosystem service; and (2) comprehensive discussion as to how incorporating sense of place in an evaluation can uncover potential benefits for both biodiversity conservation and human well-being. Sense of place provides physical and psychological benefits to people, and has neglected economic value. The biodiversity-related experiences are essential components of the service that need to be further explored. A conceptual framework was used to explore how the existing knowledge on sense of place derived from other fields can be used to inform conservation decision-making, but further research is needed to fill existing gaps in knowledge. This review contributes to a better understanding of the role biodiversity plays in human well-being, and should inform the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES).
Global change, especially land-use intensification, affects human well-being by impacting the delivery of multiple ecosystem services (multifunctionality). However, whether biodiversity loss is a major component of global change effects on multifunctionality in real-world ecosystems, as in experimental ones, remains unclear. Therefore, we assessed biodiversity, functional composition and 14 ecosystem services on 150 agricultural grasslands differing in land-use intensity. We also introduce five multifunctionality measures in which ecosystem services were weighted according to realistic land-use objectives. We found that indirect land-use effects, i.e. those mediated by biodiversity loss and by changes to functional composition, were as strong as direct effects on average. Their strength varied with land-use objectives and regional context. Biodiversity loss explained indirect effects in a region of intermediate productivity and was most damaging when land-use objectives favoured supporting and cultural services. In contrast, functional composition shifts, towards fast-growing plant species, strongly increased provisioning services in more inherently unproductive grasslands.
© 2015 The Authors Ecology Letters published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd and CNRS.
The central challenge of the 21st century is to develop economic, social, and governance systems capable of ending poverty and achieving sustainable levels of population and consumption while securing the life-support systems underpinning current and future human well-being. Essential to meeting this challenge is the incorporation of natural capital and the ecosystem services it provides into decision-making. We explore progress and crucial gaps at this frontier, reflecting upon the 10 y since the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. We focus on three key dimensions of progress and ongoing challenges: raising awareness of the interdependence of ecosystems and human well-being, advancing the fundamental interdisciplinary science of ecosystem services, and implementing this science in decisions to restore natural capital and use it sustainably. Awareness of human dependence on nature is at an all-time high, the science of ecosystem services is rapidly advancing, and talk of natural capital is now common from governments to corporate boardrooms. However, successful implementation is still in early stages. We explore why ecosystem service information has yet to fundamentally change decision-making and suggest a path forward that emphasizes: (i) developing solid evidence linking decisions to impacts on natural capital and ecosystem services, and then to human well-being; (ii) working closely with leaders in government, business, and civil society to develop the knowledge, tools, and practices necessary to integrate natural capital and ecosystem services into everyday decision-making; and (iii) reforming institutions to change policy and practices to better align private short-term goals with societal long-term goals.
The importance of biodiversity for the integrated functioning of ecosystems remains unclear because most evidence comes from analyses of biodiversity's effect on individual functions. Here we show that the effects of biodiversity on ecosystem function become more important as more functions are considered. We present the first systematic investigation of biodiversity's effect on ecosystem multifunctionality across multiple taxa, trophic levels and habitats using a comprehensive database of 94 manipulations of species richness. We show that species-rich communities maintained multiple functions at higher levels than depauperate ones. These effects were stronger for herbivore biodiversity than for plant biodiversity, and were remarkably consistent across aquatic and terrestrial habitats. Despite observed tradeoffs, the overall effect of biodiversity on multifunctionality grew stronger as more functions were considered. These results indicate that prior research has underestimated the importance of biodiversity for ecosystem functioning by focusing on individual functions and taxonomic groups.
Natural capital is essential for goods and services on which people depend. Yet pressures on the environment mean that natural capital assets are continuing to decline and degrade, putting such benefits at risk. Systematic monitoring of natural assets is a major challenge that could be both unaffordable and unmanageable without a way to focus efforts. Here we introduce a simple approach, based on the commonly used management tool of a risk register, to highlight natural assets whose condition places benefits at risk.
We undertake a preliminary assessment using a risk register for natural capital assets in the UK based solely on existing information. The status and trends of natural capital assets are assessed using asset–benefit relationships for ten kinds of benefits (food, fibre (timber), energy, aesthetics, freshwater (quality), recreation, clean air, wildlife, hazard protection and equable climate) across eight broad habitat types in the UK based on three dimensions of natural capital within each of the habitat types (quality, quantity and spatial configuration). We estimate the status and trends of benefits relative to societal targets using existing regulatory limits and policy commitments, and allocate scores of high, medium or low risk to asset–benefit relationships that are both subject to management and of concern.
The risk register approach reveals substantial gaps in knowledge about asset–benefit relationships which limit the scope and rigour of the assessment (especially for marine and urban habitats). Nevertheless, we find strong indications that certain assets (in freshwater, mountain, moors and heathland habitats) are at high risk in relation to their ability to sustain certain benefits (especially freshwater, wildlife and climate regulation).
Synthesis and applications. With directed data gathering, especially to monitor trends, improve metrics related to asset–benefit relationships, and improve understanding of nonlinearities and thresholds, the natural capital risk register could provide a useful tool. If updated regularly, it could direct monitoring efforts, focus research and protect and manage those natural assets where benefits are at highest risk.
How often do people visit the world's protected areas (PAs)? Despite PAs covering one-eighth of the land and being a major focus of nature-based recreation and tourism, we don't know. To address this, we compiled a globally-representative database of visits to PAs and built region-specific models predicting visit rates from PA size, local population size, remoteness, natural attractiveness, and national income. Applying these models to all but the very smallest of the world's terrestrial PAs suggests that together they receive roughly 8 billion (8 x 109) visits/y-of which more than 80% are in Europe and North America. Linking our region-specific visit estimates to valuation studies indicates that these visits generate approximately US $600 billion/y in direct in-country expenditure and US $250 billion/y in consumer surplus. These figures dwarf current, typically inadequate spending on conserving PAs. Thus, even without considering the many other ecosystem services that PAs provide to people, our findings underscore calls for greatly increased investment in their conservation.
Significance
Many ecosystem services are public goods available to everyone without charge, but the provision of these services often depends on the actions of private landowners who may bear cost to provide services. How to design incentives when the provision of services depends on the landscape pattern of conservation and where landowners have private information about costs presents a difficult challenge. Here we apply results from auction theory to design a payments scheme that achieves optimal provision of ecosystem services with spatially dependent benefits and asymmetric information. The auction mechanism works equally well whether property rights reside with the landowners so that the regulator pays landowners to conserve, or with the regulator so that landowners pay the regulator to develop.
The June 2012 issue of Environment and Development Economics published a symposium with considerable focus on our paper, ‘Sustainability and the measurement of wealth’. The Symposium also contained five articles in which other researchers offered valuable comments on our paper. The present note replies to those comments. It clarifies important issues and reveals how important questions relating to sustainability analysis can be fruitfully addressed within our framework. These include questions about the treatment of time, the use of shadow prices and the treatment of transnational externalities. This note also offers new theoretical results that help substantiate our earlier empirical finding that the value of human health is something very different from the value of the consumption permitted by health and survival.
Landscapes generate a wide range of valuable ecosystem services, yet land-use decisions often ignore the value of these services.
Using the example of the United Kingdom, we show the significance of land-use change not only for agricultural production
but also for emissions and sequestration of greenhouse gases, open-access recreational visits, urban green space, and wild-species
diversity. We use spatially explicit models in conjunction with valuation methods to estimate comparable economic values for
these services, taking account of climate change impacts. We show that, although decisions that focus solely on agriculture
reduce overall ecosystem service values, highly significant value increases can be obtained from targeted planning by incorporating
all potential services and their values and that this approach also conserves wild-species diversity.
We review the evidence of regime shifts in terrestrial and aquatic environments in relation to resilience of complex adaptive ecosystems and the functional roles of biological diversity in this context. The evidence reveals that the likelihood of regime shifts may increase when humans reduce resilience by such actions as removing response diversity, removing whole functional groups of species, or removing whole trophic levels; impacting on ecosystems via emissions of waste and pollutants and climate change; and altering the magnitude, frequency, and duration of disturbance regimes. The combined and often synergistic effects of those pressures can make ecosystems more vulnerable to changes that previously could be absorbed. As a consequence, ecosystems may suddenly shift from desired to less desired states in their capacity to generate ecosystem services. Active adaptive management and governance of resilience will be required to sustain desired ecosystem states and transform degraded ecosystems into fundamentally new and more desirable configurations.
We develop a consistent and comprehensive theoretical framework for assessing whether economic growth is compatible with sustaining well-being over time. The framework focuses on whether a comprehensive measure of wealth – one that accounts for natural capital and human capital as well as reproducible capital – is maintained through time. Our framework also integrates population growth, technological change, and changes in health. We apply the framework to five countries that differ significantly in stages of development and resource bases: the United States, China, Brazil, India, and Venezuela. With the exception of Venezuela, significant increases in human capital enable comprehensive wealth to be maintained (and sustainability to be achieved) despite significant reductions in the natural resource base. We find that the value of “health capital” is very large relative to other forms of capital. As a result, its growth rate critically influences the growth rate of per-capita comprehensive wealth.Institutional subscribers to the NBER working paper series, and residents of developing countries may download this paper without additional charge at www.nber.org.
The most unique feature of Earth is the existence of life, and the most extraordinary feature of life is its diversity. Approximately 9 million types of plants, animals, protists and fungi inhabit the Earth. So, too, do 7 billion people. Two decades ago, at the first Earth Summit, the vast majority of the world's nations declared that human actions were dismantling the Earth's ecosystems, eliminating genes, species and biological traits at an alarming rate. This observation led to the question of how such loss of biological diversity will alter the functioning of ecosystems and their ability to provide society with the goods and services needed to prosper.
The paper seeks to contribute to the expanding literature on ecosystem service assessment by considering its integration with
economic analyses of such services. Focussing upon analyses for future orientated policy and decision making, we initially
consider a single period during which ecological stocks are maintained at sustainable levels. The flow of ecosystems services
and their contribution to welfare bearing goods is considered and methods for valuing resultant benefits are reviewed and
illustrated via a case study of land use change. We then broaden our time horizon to discuss the treatment of future costs
and benefits. Finally we relax our sustainability assumption and consider economic approaches to the incorporation of depleting
ecological assets with a particular focus upon stocks which exhibit thresholds below which restoration is compromised.
KeywordsEcosystem services–Economic valuation–Stocks and flows–Wellbeing–Spatial and temporal issues–Sustainability–Irreversibility–UK National Ecosystem Assessment (UK NEA)
This book explores ways to measure the quality of life, a problem pervading a number of academic disciplines, but not confined to the academic realm. Indices of human well‐being in current use are insensitive to human dependence on the natural environment, both at a moment in time and across generations. Moreover, international discussions on economic development in poor regions frequently ignore the natural resource base. In developing quality‐of‐life measures, the author pays particular attention to the natural environment, illustrating how it can be incorporated, more generally, into economic reasoning.
The discussion offers a comprehensive account of the newly emergent subject of ecological economics. Connections between biodiversity, ecosystem services, resource scarcities, and economic possibilities for the future are developed in a quantitative but accessible language. Familiar terms such as ‘sustainable development’, ‘social discount rates’ and Earth's ‘carrying capacity’ are given a firm theoretical underpinning.
The theory developed is used in extended commentaries on the economics of population, poverty traps, global warming, structural adjustment programmes and free trade. The author shows that, whether for valuing the state of affairs in a country or evaluating economic policy there, the index that should be used is the economy's wealth, which is the social worth of its capital assets. The concept of wealth adopted is comprehensive, including not only manufactured assets but also human capital, knowledge, and the natural environment. Wealth is contrasted with popular measures of human well‐being, such as gross national product and the United Nations Development Programme's Human Development Index. The theory is applied repeatedly to data on poor countries, revealing a picture that contrasts sharply with that portrayed in the contemporary literature on economic development.