•Global ecosystem services value can differ by $81trillion/yr by 2050 by scenario.•Land use change and management underlays our estimates.•We provide global assessments and details for every ...country.•Countries with deserts see the greatest effects.•The Great Transition scenario can allow a sustainable and desirable future.
We estimated the future value of ecosystem services in monetary units for 4 alternative global land use and management scenarios based on the Great Transition Initiative (GTI) scenarios to the year 2050. We used previous estimates of the per biome values of ecosystem services in 2011 as the basis for comparison. We mapped projected land-use for 16biomes at 1km2 resolution globally for each scenario. This, combined with differences in land management for each scenario, created estimates of global ecosystem services values that also allowed for examinations of individual countries. Results show that under different scenarios the global value of ecosystem services can decline by $51trillion/yr or increase by USD $30trillion/yr. In addition to the global values, we report totals for all countries and maps for a few example countries. Results show that adopting a set of policies similar to those required to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals, would greatly enhance ecosystem services, human wellbeing and sustainability.
•Global loss of ecosystem services due to land use change is $US 4.3–20.2trillion/yr.•Ecoservices contribute more than twice as much to human well-being as global GDP.•Estimates in monetary units are ...useful to show the relative magnitude of ecoservices.•Valuation of ecosystem services is not the same as commodification or privatization.•Ecosystem services are best considered public goods requiring new institutions.
In 1997, the global value of ecosystem services was estimated to average $33trillion/yr in 1995 $US ($46trillion/yr in 2007 $US). In this paper, we provide an updated estimate based on updated unit ecosystem service values and land use change estimates between 1997 and 2011. We also address some of the critiques of the 1997 paper. Using the same methods as in the 1997 paper but with updated data, the estimate for the total global ecosystem services in 2011 is $125trillion/yr (assuming updated unit values and changes to biome areas) and $145trillion/yr (assuming only unit values changed), both in 2007 $US. From this we estimated the loss of eco-services from 1997 to 2011 due to land use change at $4.3–20.2trillion/yr, depending on which unit values are used. Global estimates expressed in monetary accounting units, such as this, are useful to highlight the magnitude of eco-services, but have no specific decision-making context. However, the underlying data and models can be applied at multiple scales to assess changes resulting from various scenarios and policies. We emphasize that valuation of eco-services (in whatever units) is not the same as commodification or privatization. Many eco-services are best considered public goods or common pool resources, so conventional markets are often not the best institutional frameworks to manage them. However, these services must be (and are being) valued, and we need new, common asset institutions to better take these values into account.
•We review the history leading up to two 1997 publications on ecosystem services.•We review the subsequent debates, research, and institutions they triggered.•We summarize lessons learned during the ...20years since 1997.•We provide recommendations for the future of research and practice.•Ecosystem services are at the core of the fundamental changes needed in economics.
It has been 20years since two seminal publications about ecosystem services came out: an edited book by Gretchen Daily and an article in Nature by a group of ecologists and economists on the value of the world’s ecosystem services. Both of these have been very highly cited and kicked off an explosion of research, policy, and applications of the idea, including the establishment of this journal. This article traces the history leading up to these publications and the subsequent debates, research, institutions, policies, on-the-ground actions, and controversies they triggered. It also explores what we have learned during this period about the key issues: from definitions to classification to valuation, from integrated modelling to public participation and communication, and the evolution of institutions and governance innovation. Finally, it provides recommendations for the future. In particular, it points to the weakness of the mainstream economic approaches to valuation, growth, and development. It concludes that the substantial contributions of ecosystem services to the sustainable wellbeing of humans and the rest of nature should be at the core of the fundamental change needed in economic theory and practice if we are to achieve a societal transformation to a sustainable and desirable future.
We use two datasets to characterize impacts on ecosystem services. The first is a spatially explicit measure of the impact of human consumption or ‘demand’ on ecosystem services as measured by the ...human appropriation of net primary productivity (HANPP) derived from population distributions and aggregate national statistics. The second is an actual measure of loss of productivity or a proxy measure of ‘supply’ of ecosystem services derived from biophysical models, agricultural census data, and other empirical measures. This proxy measure of land degradation is the ratio of actual NPP to potential NPP. The HANPP dataset suggests that current ‘demand’ for NPP exceeds ‘supply’ at a corresponding ecosystem service value of $10.5 trillion per year. The land degradation measure suggests that we have lost $6.3 trillion per year of ecosystem service value to impaired ecosystem function. Agriculture amounts to 2.8% of global GDP. With global GDP standing at $63 trillion in 2010, all of agriculture represents $1.7 Trillion of the world's GDP. Our estimate of lost ecosystem services represent a significantly larger fraction (~10%) of global GDP. This is one reason the economics of land degradation is about a lot more than the market value of agricultural products alone.
In early 2020, Indonesia implemented the biodiesel 30 (B30) program as an initiative to reduce Indonesia’s dependency on fossil fuels and to protect Indonesia’s palm oil market. However, palm oil has ...received international criticism due to its association with harmful environmental externalities. This paper analysed whether an investment in palm oil-based biofuel (POBB) provides Indonesia with the ability to achieve its environmental and financial goals. In this research, we performed a meta-analysis on biofuel energy return on investment (EROI) by examining 44 biofuel projects using ten types of biofuel feedstocks from 13 countries between 1995 and 2016. Results showed an average EROI of 3.92 and 3.22 for POBB and other biomass-based biofuels (OBBB), respectively. This shows that if only energy inputs and outputs are considered, biofuels provide a positive energy return. However, biofuels, including those from palm oil, produce externalities especially during land preparation and land restoration. We also compared these EROI biofuel results with other renewable energy sources and further analysed the implications for renewable energies to meet society’s energy demands in the future. Results showed that biofuel gives the lowest EROI compared to other renewable energy sources. Its EROI of 3.92, while positive, has been categorised as “not feasible for development”. If Indonesia plans to continue with its biofuel program, some major improvements will be necessary.
“Ecosystem Services” is now a well-defined and active enough field of scholarship to warrant its own academic journal (this paper is published in the inaugural issue). In this paper we describe the ...authorship structure of this rapidly emerging transdisciplinary field, which has so far generated over 2400 papers (as of January 2011) listed in ISI Web of Science journals, written by over 2000 authors since the 1990s. We describe the number of publications, the number and interconnection of co-authors, clusters of co-authors, and other variables for the top 172 authors who have authored or co-authored more than 5 papers each. These 172 authors together have written over half the total papers. This allows a coherent picture of current participants in the field and their collaborative interconnections. These methods can be applied to any topic area and represent one way to better understand and support emerging scholarship that goes beyond disciplinary boundaries.
► Ecosystem services is a rapidly emerging field of transdisciplinary scholarship. ► We describe the co-authorship structure of the field for the top 172 authors. ► Clusters of co-authorship reveal aspects of the social capital in the field. ► Ecosystem services is highly productive compared to other fields.
•The overall economic impact of planned Mekong hydropower projects would be negative.•The value of capture fisheries loss is much larger than hydropower benefits.•Social mitigation costs and loss of ...sediment also have a significant impact.•The economic impact on Lao PDR and Thailand is forecast to be positive.•Vietnam and Cambodia are forecast to suffer large negative economic impacts.
The Mekong River is the largest freshwater fishery and the third most bio-diverse river system in the world. Two of 11 planned mainstream hydropower projects, Xayaburi and Don Sahong, are nearly completed and a third project proposal, Pak Beng, has been submitted by the Lao PDR government for consideration. This paper builds on previous studies and examines the tradeoffs (between water use, food security supply and energy production) for the proposed mainstream hydropower projects in the Lower Mekong Basin (LMB).
The paper concludes that the forecast loss of capture fisheries, sediment/nutrients and social mitigation costs measured as Net Present Value (NPV at 10% discount rate) are greater than the benefits from electricity generation, improved irrigation and flood control. The paper also forecasts huge negative economic impacts for Cambodia and Vietnam in contrast to previous Mekong River Commission’s (MRC) conclusions that all countries will benefit from hydropower development.
The paper recommends reassessing the economic impacts of hydropower development using full environmental cost accounting. It also recommends that a new LMB energy strategy be developed taking into account less hydropower income than previously anticipated, updated forecasts for LMB power demand and anticipated technology developments for improved energy efficiency & renewable energy (especially solar which is now competitive with hydropower).
•Increasing land degradation from management is costly and needs to be valued.•All necessary data is available but scattered and needs consolidation.•Measure of human well-being requires measure of ...all the capitals.•Models that include all capitals as well as the human factor should be prioritized.
This review assesses existing data, models, and other knowledge-based methods for valuing the effects of sustainable land management including the cost of land degradation on a global scale. The overall development goal of sustainable human well-being should be to obtain social, ecologic, and economic viability, not merely growth of the market economy. Therefore new and more integrated methods to value sustainable development are needed. There is a huge amount of data and methods currently available to model and analyze land management practices. However, it is scattered and requires consolidation and reformatting to be useful. In this review we collected and evaluated databases and computer models that could be useful for analyzing and valuing land management options for sustaining natural capital and maximizing ecosystem services. The current methods and models are not well equipped to handle large scale transdisciplinary analyses and a major conclusion of this synthesis paper is that there is a need for further development of the integrated approaches, which considers all four types of capital (human, built, natural, and social), and their interaction at spatially explicit, multiple scales. This should be facilitated by adapting existing models and make them and their outcomes more accessible to stakeholders. Other shortcomings and caveats of models should be addressed by adding the ‘human factor’, for instance, in participatory decision-making and scenario testing. For integration of the models themselves, a more participatory approach to model development is also recommended, along with the possibility of adding advanced gaming interfaces to the models to allow them to be “played” by a large number of interested parties and their trade-off decisions to be accumulated and compared.
While self-reported life satisfaction (LS) has become an important research and policy tool, much debate still surrounds the question of what causes LS to change in certain individuals, while not in ...others. Set-point theory argues that individuals have a relatively resilient LS or "set point" (i.e. there is a certain LS level that individuals return to even after major life events). Here, we describe the extent to which LS varies over time for 12,643 individuals living in Australia who participated in at least eight annual waves of the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey. We use the standard deviation (SD) of year-on-year LS by individuals (SD of LS) as a measure of instability and an inverse proxy for resilience. We then model SD of LS as the dependent variable against average LS scores over time by individual, Big Five personality scores by individual, the number of waves the individual participated in, and other control variables. We found that SD of LS was higher (lower resilience) in participants with a lower average LS and greater degrees of extraversion and agreeableness. Set-point theory thus applies more to individuals whose average LS is already high and whose personality traits facilitate higher resilience. We were able to explain about 35% of the stability in LS. These results are critical in designing policies aimed at improving people's lives.
•Precision as judged by study authors increases as more time and money is spent on valuation studies.•Perceived precision increases with a study’s total cost ((adjusted R2 = 0.29, ...p = 0.018)•Perceived precision increases with the number of person years required to complete it (R2 = 0.31, p = 0.22)•Available resources (expertise, time, money), desired scope, and necessary precision help choose the appropriate ESV method.•Data availability and collection remain the main constraints in conducting ESV studies.
Ecosystem services valuation (ESV) is increasingly used to provide the impetus to sustainably manage and restore ecosystems. When undertaking an ESV study, the available resources, desired scope, and necessary precision must be considered before determining the most appropriate approach. A broad range of techniques exist to support valuation studies, requiring a range of financial, time, and personnel resources. We surveyed authors that completed 56 responses around valuation studies regarding their total costs (including personnel costs) and the perceived precision of their results. Results show that the perceived precision of their results is statistically significant and increases with the cost of a study (adjusted R2 = 0.29, p = 0.018) and the number of person years required to complete it (R2 = 0.31, p = 0.22). Understanding the trade-offs between the costs of the study and the precision of the results allows policymakers and practitioners to make more informed decisions about which ESV methods are most cost effective for their needs. For example, basic value transfer techniques require minimal resources to implement but lack precision in the final estimates, while integrated modelling techniques provide dynamic, spatially explicit, and more precise estimates but are significantly more expensive and time consuming to implement. However, these techniques are not mutually exclusive. A quick, inexpensive initial analysis may support and motivate more elaborate and detailed studies.
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