The NERC Valuing Nature Network (VNN) will release a call for proposals next week with a deadline of 16th September.

The VNN is an interdisciplinary network of natural, social and economic scientists. The proposals being sought through this initial phase will be for year-long projects, expected to report in the October 2012. It is anticipated that the initial projects will lay the ground for a more substantive phase two, with the results of the initial projects informing the second research call.

The announcements follows a series of discipinary scoping workshops which have taken place in London over the past six weeks, culminating in an interdisciplinary town hall meeting at the end of June. The workshop series brought together researchers to consider the challenges to putting a value on natural capital and the research questions which the network should seek to address. As a result, two major themes have emerged in the work of the VNN:

‘1. Developing a trans-disciplinary framework for the valuation of stocks of natural capital and flows of ecosystem services’.
Natural and social scientists to work together to develop integrated methods for monetary and non-monetary valuation of natural capital and ecosystem services. Teams also to work to identify how natural capital and ecosystem services can be managed sustainably.

‘2. Characterising the socio-ecological system knowledge required to properly capture the value of biodiversity, ecosystem services and natural resources’.
Evaluate the information available in relation to the valuation of natural resource stocks and ecosystem service flows, recognising the limitations and uncertainties in the current knowledge base. Identify ways to improve the accessibility and the integration of this existing data, including socioeconomic data sets. Develop integrated models of natural capital and ecosystem services at relevant spatial and temporal scales.

Further information is available from the VNN website.

The European commission yesterday proposed a new strategy to achieve the 2020 biodiversity targets by incorporating the valuation of natural capital. The new strategy, which is based on a report by The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB), states that the economic value of ecosystems in Europe must be factored into decision making at all levels.

This announcement follows the failure of the European Union to achieve the 2010 biodiversity target to halt and reverse the loss of biodiversity within Europe. It has become clear that current legislation is ineffective with only 11% of protected ecosystems in a favourable status despite the wide range of efforts deployed to protect nature, and the establishment of an extensive network of protected areas (Natura 2000). The new strategy blames, among other causes, lack of consideration for the economic value of biodiversity for the failure to meet past targets.

TEEB has estimated that the economic cost of loosing biodiversity dwarfs the cost of adequate protection. For example over fishing costs the fisheries industry over $50 billion annually. Janez Potočnik the EU environment commissioner stated that “It is a much smarter economic investment to protect the diversity of life and healthy ecosystems than face tragedy once diversity has been lost,”

The 2020 target to halt the loss of biodiversity and degradation of ecosystem services has been divided into six main goals covering the protection of biodiversity and ecosystem services, improving the contribution of agriculture forestry and fisheries to conservation, and addressing the worldwide biodiversity crisis.

Europe plans to achieve these goals by:
• Building on the biodiversity knowledge base by identifying research gaps, contributing to the intergovernmental science-policy platform on biodiversity and ecosystem services, and establishing a monitoring and review procedure for the strategy.
• Setting up market based mechanisms to attract funding for the protection of ecosystem services, and to encourage projects that deliver multiple benefits.
• Establish a coherent message about biodiversity in the common agricultural policy, fisheries policy and water framework directive.
• Interacting with a wide variety of stakeholders through the EU business and biodiversity platform to help share successful initiatives and best practice.
• Engaging civil society in the hope they will become actively involved in achieving the targets.

TEEB estimates that this strategy could create new jobs and business opportunities worth 2 to 6 trillion dollars by 2050.

The full communication can be seen here.

Yesterday evening, Jonathon Porritt, founder of Forum for the Future and chair of the Sustainable Development Commission, spoke at the annual Burntwood lecture, hosted by Institution of Environmental Science.

In a dynamic talk, Porritt described the so-called “growth fetish” of modern society, in which emphasis is increasingly put on economic growth, measured by Gross Domestic Product, above all other indicators of success. He also spoke on the role of human rights and development NGOs in fighting the cause for environmentalism, stating that they had failed to address the root of the problem.

Population growth, he said, was a key factor in the debate on how to achieve “a sustainable low-carbon economy”, a piece of the puzzle that had thus far been ‘missed out’. As a result, natural and economic resources would continue to be stretched to unsustainable levels, with almost every significant trend in consumption- including water, food and energy- increasing steadily. He assured that establishing a ‘real’ global price on carbon emissions was also vital, if the world is to lower its greenhouse gas emissions to at least 50% on 1990 levels by 2050, avoiding the dangerous effects of climate change. This would be equivalent to 6g of carbon dioxide per US dollar ($) of economic growth by 2050, whilst current levels are approximately 750g of carbon dioxide per dollar of growth.

Mr Porritt then suggested the essential tools needed to get us to a ‘sustainable economy’. He supported the idea that innovation and technological advancement, driven by a need for sustainable consumption, would also bring huge benefits economically. ‘Marketisation’, or valuation of natural assets including Ecosystem Services, would help to create an economic model in which preservation of natural assets remains more profitable than environmental destruction. “It’s about using nature’s wealth more sustainably”, Porritt stated. He suggested that political corruption and the rise of ‘Denialism’ were responsible for the majority of inaction on global over-consumption, which has lead to runaway environmental destruction.

Mr Porritt then called on NGOs and environmental advocates to start focussing their effort towards promoting “limits to growth”, to stop what he regarded as “the systematic betrayal of young people today”. Relentlessly increasing levels of consumption were “completely non-viable”, he added. He commented that well-known NGOs, such as Friends of the Earth and WWF, should make more effort to address the economic developmental pressures of the world today, in order to remain the “lifeblood” of the environmental movement.

A lively question and answer session followed the lecture, in which Trewin Restorick – CEO of Global Action Plan- and representatives from WWF-UK disputed Porritt’s claims that the NGOs strategy on global sustainability was “inadequate”. Mr Porritt also acknowledged the significant positive effect” that had been made by thinking and research on ecosystem services, in making biodiversity conservation more effective. He believes that understanding the “economics of natural capital” will help to further expose the irreversible costs of environmental destruction.

Other questions from the floor related to the role of innovation and technology in achieving his vision of ‘a sustainable low carbon economy’. Mr Porritt commented that innovation in ‘green technology’ did not have to come at the expense of economic recovery. He also praised leadership from “forward thinking entrepreneurs” in partnership with the private sector, for contributing to a “thriving” portfolio of low-carbon technologies, against the backdrop of political failure to establish a “price on carbon”. Further progress was being ’stunted’ by a lack of “market-based controls on carbon”, which would allow these technologies to become more economical, he said.

A panel discussion was held yesterday evening at the Judge Business School in Cambridge, entitled ‘The price of extinction: what losing biodiversity costs’. The event was part of the Cambridge Science Festival, in collaboration with Cambridge Conservation Initiative and Science Magazine.

Tim Radford from The Guardian opened the discussion by highlighting the global scale of biodiversity loss: one eighth of birds, 13% of flowering plants and one quarter of mammals are currently at risk of extinction. The panel members were asked in turn to give their opinions on the most important issues for biodiversity conservation.

Dr Hazell Thompson from Birdlife International and Dr Ruth Swetnam from the Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, were in agreement that a valuation system for biodiversity is required. Dr Thompson explained that biodiversity conservation often loses out because it is not practically valuable to the people who actually bear the cost of protecting biodiversity. For example, constructing mines in the rainforest in West Africa has a greater economic benefit for local people than protecting the rainforest. Dr Swetnam detailed the main physical resources that are provided by biodiversity, such as food, fuel and climate regulation, and concluded that if we don’t assign monetary value to biodiversity then the value will in effect be zero, and this will inevitably lead to biodiversity loss. In contrast, in the view of William Kendall from Green and Black’s, assigning value to biodiversity will not work in the world of business because business values immediate profits, so the benefits of biodiversity conservation are not considered because they are remote and poorly calculated. In his view, biodiversity conservation can only be incorporated into business through regulation, whether this is through external regulation such as government incentives, or self-regulation through customer pressure. Although valuation and regulation were presented in the debate as opposing views, perhaps they could go hand-in-hand: valuing biodiversity could be an important factor in implementing regulation.

Pamela Abbott, chair of Cambridge Conservation Forum, put forward the point that there could be huge benefits to human health of protecting biodiversity, which would reduce government spending on healthcare. For example, a 10% increase in local green space can increase life expectancy by five years. She brought the issue of biodiversity loss down to a local scale, using the catchphrase ‘Extinction begins at home’, and suggested that individuals can have a significant input into conserving biodiversity through making wildlife gardens.

Professor Bill Adams from the Department of Geography, University of Cambridge, talked about the issue of how much biodiversity we actually need. He mentioned the recent paper published in Nature on Planetary Boundaries, in which Johan Röckstrom defined limits for the capacity of the planet to cope with anthropogenic changes, including biodiversity loss. Professor Adams suggested that the particular boundaries which are considered to be important by rich countries might differ from those which are important to poor countries, such as those supporting food production. This issue was also raised in the discussion afterwards, bringing up the fact that most of the initiatives for conservation of biodiversity come from the developed world, while most of the remaining biodiversity is in developing countries. Dr Ruth Swetnam put it plainly, saying that since the UK has already cut down most of its trees, we are not in a good position to tell the inhabitants of developing countries to keep their trees when they have families to feed. Perhaps biodiversity conservation will take a different angle if more people from developing countries become involved.

The latest report of the TEEB study was released on Friday, 13 November. ‘The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity for National and International Policy Makers 2009′ follows the TEEB Interim Report, released in May 2008. The next releases; ‘TEEB for Local Administrators’ and ‘TEEB for Business’ reports, will be released in summer 2010, whilst the final TEEB synthesis report will be published in time for the 10th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity in autumn next year.

The latest document is intended to highlight the relevance of the TEEB study to mainstream policy-making, providing evidence to support a strong case for policy action; concrete examples of ways to make policies work (from removing subsidies to payments for ecosystem services) and practical guidance for managing the transition during policy reform.

TEEB is built around the central point that the lack of market prices for ecosystem services and biodiversity means that the public benefits we derive from these goods are usually neglected or under-valued in decision-making. By failing to account for the value of ecosystems and biodiversity we will make the wrong choices in responding to the global challenges of climate change, food, water and energy security. Making the benefits of biodiversity and ecosystem services visible to economies and society is necessary to pave the way for more efficient policy responses.

Download the full report and the executive summary.

Access the TEEB website.

Pavan Sukhdev, leader of the TEEB review (The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity), yesterday delivered the 9th annual Darwin Initiative Lecture in London.

The central theme of Mr Sukhdev’s presentation was the need for a ‘new economics’ to take into account measures of human progress traditionally excluded from nations’ GDP figures. He gave the example of India, with newspaper headlines currently proclaiming 9% GDP growth, despite the global economic downturn. Mr Sukhdev challenged this figure: did this equate to a 9% increase in the quality of healthcare delivered for the population, for example? A quote from a leading economist, taken in 1968, stressed that “GDP is unfit for purpose”; Mr Sukhdev argued that nothing had changed in this respect.

The example of Yasuni National Park, Ecuador, ilustrated the possibilities offered by removing ‘public goods’ from the public domain and so avoiding the so-called ‘Tragedy of the Commons’. Ecuador has pledged not to exploit the 20% of its proven oil field found within the national park, calculating a £1.6 billion opportunity cost for not doing so, and pricing the carbon it will have ‘locked in’ the oil field at £1.7 billion, based on the market rate for carbon. Ecuador is currently seeking investors under this REDD (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) initiative. The investment will allow the country to spend on renewable technologies, shifting away from oil dependence, and be channelled into communities for an improvement in the population’s quality of life.

Breakout groups followed the lecture, considering the next stages of the TEEB review. It was clear from discussion that, in order to mainstream valuation of ecosystem services and ‘natural capital’ into decision making, the results of the review must be considered not just by countries’ environment ministries but by their treasuries, and by the World Bank. Over the next few months the TEEB team will be seeking input into their review, in the form of evidence, and further suggestions for influencing policy-makers.

For more information see: http://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/biodiversity/economics/

It’s not the economy, but ecology which is the key to the survival of the human species, stated Sir John Harman, Chairman of the Environment Agency, in his closing remarks to the IEEM summer conference, attended by the BES’s Policy Team. Sir John called for a ‘new economics’ to tackle the tough environmental challenges we face today. He also urged greater collaboration between ecologists and economists and stressed the importance of ecologists engaging with policy-makers.

The theme of the conference was “Moving to an Ecological Economy”, with speakers discussing how ecology can drive the valuation of biodiversity and natural resources:

Peter Head, a Director of ARUP, outlined his work with the company in developing Dongtan, an innovative new eco-city to be built in China, on an island north of Shanghai. The first phase of construction will be completed in 2010, and when Dongtan is finished it will provide sustainable, ‘green’ homes for 80,000 people. Just some of the exciting measures to be adopted in the city include the use of used rice husks to power a Combined Heat and Power (CHP) plant, widespread use of photovoltaic cells to harness energy from the sun, the use of anaerobic digesters to process all biological waste and extensive food production within the city to compensate for the land lost through the building of the development.

Peter highlighted the work of ARUP in creating pilot schemes for public-private partnerships, which he hopes will lead to street by street transitions to sustainability and ‘one planet living’ at, at least initially, a regional scale.

Shulamit Alony, Business and Biodiversity Officer at the Countdown 2010 initative, developed by the IUCN, outlined the work of Countdown 2010 in encouraging Governments to increase momentum towards the CBD target. Countdown 2010 has also been working with industry to ‘green’ their activities, working with both multi-national companies and small and medium enterprises across Europe whose activities either impact on biodiversity or depend directly on biodiversity for their profits.

David Calpin, Defra’s head of strategy in the Natural Environment division, outlined the shift in thinking at Defra towards a holistic whole ecosystems focus, discussing the Ecosystem Approach Action Plan.

Dr Mike Christie, University of Aberystwyth and Salman Hussein, Scottish Agricultural College, discussed separate studies they have undertaken for Defra to put a value on ecosystem services. Dr Christie has undertaken on valuing the Biodiversity Action Plan (BAP), whilst Salman Hussein has explored different scenarios for conserving biodiversity as proposed by the Marine Bill. Salman’s team have developed a methodology to quantify the economic costs and benefits of implementing Marine Protected Zones as either ‘Highly Restricted’ or ‘Maintenance of Conservation Status’, under which different levels of potentially damaging activities would be allowed by the Marine Bill.

Overall, the message to emerge from the day was that innovative work was being undertaken by environmental economists, and by others in the economics and ecological communities in this area. Yet, putting a value on biodiversity and ecosystem services is never going to be simple and much more work is required in order for HM Treasury to take the Ecosystem Approach seriously. The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity Review (TEEB) Review, being conducted at EU level, could provide a powerful tool to force the Government to recognise the true cost to the UK of failing to halt biodiversity loss.

Sir Nicholas Stern has warned that his 2006 review of the economics of climate change has underestimated the risks posed by accelerating global warming. Speaking this week and reported in the Guardian today, Stern said that new scientific findings showed greenhouse gas emissions were are causing more damage than was understood in 2006, when he prepared his highly influential report. Stating that “emissions are growing much faster than we thought, the absorptive capacity of the planet is less than we thought [and] the risks of greenhouse gases are potentially bigger than more cautious estimates”, he called for increasing commitments from countries to cut emissions of greenhouse gases to be translated into action.

Original article: “I underestimated the threat, says Stern”, The Guardian, 18 April 2008
(with audio to accompany the story)

A deal between two environmental organisations could provide a blueprint for investment to conserve the world’s vital ecosystem services. Canopy Capital, an environmental investment and development company, has struck a deal with Iwokrama International Centre for Rainforest Conservation and Development which owns a one million acre area of rainforest in Guyana. Canopy Capital will pay Iwokrama for the ecosystem services generated by the rainforest, including those supporting and regulating services which are often viewed as unquantifiable, such as water storage and climate regulation.

In return for its investment, Canopy Capital will receive a percentage of any income that might one day be made by the rainforest’s ecosystem services. The company hopes that the services will one day become tradeable commodities. Once the organisation has re-couped its investment, 80% of further profits will go back to the reserve to allow Iwokrama to carry out its activities.