Ecosystem Services
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Ecosystem Services
CORE CONCEPTS CORE CONCEPTS Core Concept: Ecosystem services Amy West yet to be discovered, may one day provide Science Writer pharmaceutical benefit. Growing Recognition If one were to build a healthy biosphere Efforts to assign economic value to these ser- Although many, dating back as far as Plato, from scratch on another planet, what kinds vices would follow. have expounded on humanity’slinktonature, ’ of ecosystems and combinations of species Nature s assets can provide life-sustaining the term “ecosystem services” first popped would be necessary to support humans? This benefits or ecosystem services, such as water up in a popular book in 1981, and in the purification, pest control, fisheries, and storm is the thought experiment that ecologist science literature in a 1983 paper by Ehrlich buffering. Daily notes that people place value Gretchen Daily, a Bing professor at Stanford and Mooney (4, 5). It stuck. on other essential assets, such as houses or University, poses to illustrate the crucial role Books on ecosystem services came out in cars, but nature also has a value that has been that the natural environment plays in sup- the mid-1990s, including Nature’sServices, overlooked because it hasn’t been defined or porting human society. edited by Daily (5). Since then, the rise in Efforts to spotlight the various ways human evaluated in the marketplace. Identifying eco- ’ ’ the term’s use in journal literature has been existence relies on our natural surroundings system s services worth offers economists, ecologists, and conservation biologists a com- exponential. In the 1980s, a Web of Science began in the 1980s, partly instigated by Daily’s “ ” mon parlance to discuss and debate the value search for the terms ecosystem services doctoral advisors at the time, ecologists Paul “ ” of the natural world (2). -
Increasing the Decision- Relevance of Ecosystem Service Science
natural capital PROJECT POINTS FOR POLICY MAKERS Ecosystem service assessments are often most useful for decision-making when all components RESEARCH of supply, benefit and value are included. Understanding how values to people may change under different policies or actions requires tracing BRIEF a decision’s impacts on ecosystem conditions or OCTOBER 2020 processes (supply) through to changes in supply as well as benefit. When certain components of the ecosystem services chain are omitted, this can pose challenges to integration in decision-making. For example, the benefits of sediment retention Increasing the Decision- provided by wetlands can be valued as additional energy produced by a downstream hydropower Relevance of Ecosystem plant. However, knowing how wetland restoration will increase sediment retention without accounting for the sensitivity of energy Service Science production to sediment levels poses challenges to demonstrating the value of wetland restoration to Closer integration of ecological models with socioeconomic and hydropower facilty operators or prioritizing which wetlands to restore for greatest benefit. cultural dimensions of ecosystem service will provide critical information to decision makers. Making management decisions without considering whether and how specific people benefit can exacerbate existing inequities Background and harm the people who rely on ecosystem services most. Ecosystem conditions or The dependence of human well-being on nature has become processes alone (such as acres of mangroves or increasingly understood. Since the launch of the Millennium Ecosystem tons of sediment retained) are rarely meaningful Assessment in 2005, the ecosystem services concept has gained proxies for ecosystem services delivery. Simple traction across the scientific research community as well as with benefits transfer approaches that apply a single monetary value to every acre of a particular a wide range of public- and private-sector institutions. -
Economic Valuation of Ecosystem Services
Economic Valuation of Ecosystem Services Katherine Hawkins University of Minnesota October 2003 INTRODUCTION According to Mooney and Ehrlich (1997), the idea that humans depend on natural systems dates back as far as Plato, but the first modern publication that addresses this issue is Man and Nature by George Perkins Marsh in 1864. He realized that the world’s resources were not infinite, and was aware of the importance of natural systems to soil, water, climate, waste disposal, and pest control. In the 1940's, books such as Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac (1949), Fairfield Osborn’s Our Plundered Planet (1948) and William Vogt’s Road to Survival (1948) brought new attention to the issues addressed by Marsh. The first publication that addressed ecosystems providing “services” to human society is Man’s Impact on the Global Environment by the Study of Critical Environmental Problems in 1970. They provided a list of “environmental services”, which was expanded by Holdren and Ehrlich in 1974. In subsequent publications, these services were referred to as “public services of the global ecosystem” and “nature’s services”, and were finally coined as “ecosystem services” by Ehrlich and Ehrlich in 1981. One of the first documents discussing economic valuation of ecosystem services was Proposed Practices for Economic Analysis of River Basin Projects by the Committee on Water Resources in 1958 (Bingham et al. 1995). Valuation of ecosystem continued throughout the next decades (de Groot et al. 2002), but research and attention has expanded greatly since two publications helped the subject gain popularity. The first was a book, edited by Gretchen Daily, called Nature’s Services: Societal Dependence on Natural Ecosystems (1997). -
World Bank Document
LibrarY\ Public Disclosure Authorized SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT: THE GLOBAL IMPERATIVE MV The Fairfield Osborn Memorial Lecture Public Disclosure Authorized by A. W. Clausen, President Public Disclosure Authorized The World Bank Washington, D.C. November 12, 1981 Public Disclosure Authorized __ J Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. And thank you, Mr. Reilly. I am honored to deliver this year's Fairfield Osborn Memorial Lecture in Environmental Science. I believe I'm the first banker ever to be selected for this honor, wh-ch has traditionally been accorded to distinguished conservationists. Fairfield Osborn himself, however, was a businessman -- an investment broker, who was concerned both about short-term economic development and also about its long-term sustainability. As founder and then president of the Conservation Foundation, a cosponsor of this memorial lecture, Osborn worked until his death in 1969 to arouse the concern of people everywhere to the "...accumulated velocity with which (man) is destroying his own life sources." In his book, Our Plundered Planet, which appeared in 1948, Osborn wrote: "We are rushing forward unthinkingly through days of incredible accomplishment...and we have forgotten the earth, forgotten it in the sense that we are failing to regard it as the source of our life." -2- Fairfield Osborn insisted that the only kind of development that makes sense is development .that can be sustained. Beginning, then, from this basic premise, I'll make three main points tonight: - first, that if our goal is sustainable development, our perspective must be global; - second, that human development must allow for continued economic growth, especially in the Third World, if it is to be sustainable; and - third, that sustainable development requires vigorous attention to resource management and the environment. -
Some Historical Notes on Ecological Sensibilities in Modern Western Culture
Some Historical Notes on Ecological Sensibilities in Modern Western Culture A revised version of a lecture given in the School of Economics of the University of Hyderabad in 2014 by Mark Lindley In Western culture since ca.1800, ecological sensibilities, though hardly dominant, have cropped up now and then in one way and another. This essay will include succinct descriptions of some examples illus- trating various points of concern (highlighted in bold-face font). • In 1798, Thomas Malthus, a top English economist of the generation after Adam Smith, had said that “The power [i.e. rate] of [human] population [increase] is so superior to the power of the earth to produce subsistence for man, that premature death must in some shape or other visit the human race.” He said it would happen by means of “war, pestilence, [and] famine”. (The number of humans at that time was about one thousand million.) • In 1804, William Blake published a powerful poem (though only 16 lines long) contrasting (a) the working conditions in the English cotton mills and the air pollution which their coal-burning steam engines were causing, with (b) a utopian concept of a green “new Jerusalem” in England where, he imagined, Jesus had supposedly once visited. Some lines from the poem are: “And did the Countenance Divine / Shine forth upon our clouded hills? / And was Jerusalem buildèd here / Among these dark Satanic mills?”. (A musical setting of this poem is beloved today in England. Many Brits want it to be the national anthem.) • In 1797, a French hydraulic engineer, Jean Antoine Fabre, published a book explaining (among other things) how streams flowing fast on micro-watersheds become torrents ravaging fertile valley floors. -
Remote Sensing
remote sensing Review A Review of the Sustainability Concept and the State of SDG Monitoring Using Remote Sensing Ronald C. Estoque National Institute for Environmental Studies, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8506, Japan; [email protected] or [email protected] Received: 4 April 2020; Accepted: 11 May 2020; Published: 31 May 2020 Abstract: The formulation of the 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) was a major leap forward in humankind’s quest for a sustainable future, which likely began in the 17th century, when declining forest resources in Europe led to proposals for the re-establishment and conservation of forests, a strategy that embodies the great idea that the current generation bears responsibility for future generations. Global progress toward SDG fulfillment is monitored by 231 unique social-ecological indicators spread across 169 targets, and remote sensing (RS) provides Earth observation data, directly or indirectly, for 30 (18%) of these indicators. Unfortunately, the UN Global Sustainable Development Report 2019—The Future is Now: Science for Achieving Sustainable Development concluded that, despite initial efforts, the world is not yet on track for achieving most of the SDG targets. Meanwhile, through the EO4SDG initiative by the Group on Earth Observations, the full potential of RS for SDG monitoring is now being explored at a global scale. As of April 2020, preliminary statistical data were available for 21 (70%) of the 30 RS-based SDG indicators, according to the Global SDG Indicators Database. Ten (33%) of the RS-based SDG indicators have also been included in the SDG Index and Dashboards found in the Sustainable Development Report 2019—Transformations to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. -
Detecting and Mapping Small Dams and Reservoirs
AI for Earth Grantee Profile Natural Capital Project Detecting and mapping dams and reservoirs Summary A team of researchers at the Natural Capital Project, based at Stanford University, is combining remote sensing data with machine learning to develop a model that can detect smaller dams and reservoirs. Knowing where the dams and reservoirs are located will contribute to mitigating their impact, to conserving and managing hydrological ecosystem services, and to planning development more sustainably. Detecting and mapping small dams and reservoirs Around the globe, millions of dams and reservoirs play a vital role in providing drinking water or supporting hydropower generation. Together, they can have a significant impact on the surrounding environment, such as on freshwater biodiversity. Without careful management of watershed ecosystem services, their intended functions can degrade over time. For example, deforestation and poor farming practices often lead to soil erosion, causing reservoirs to silt up and therefore minimize their capacity. Millions of dams and reservoirs around the world deliver drinking water and hydropower generation, but if not built and managed thoughtfully, they can pose risks to the environment. One of the big challenges to understanding the impact of dams and reservoirs is that only the largest have been systematically mapped. In many countries, no accessible central inventory exists. A team at Stanford University’s Natural Capital Project—Gretchen Daily (co-founder and faculty director of the Natural Capital Project), Lisa Mandle (lead scientist), Richard Sharp (software architect), and Charlotte Weil (data scientist)— want to fill this void. Knowing where the dams and reservoirs are located is the first step in being able to quantify their impact and dependence on nature, thereby guiding investments in green growth that benefit both people and the environment. -
Sustainable Development of What? Contesting Global Development Concepts and Measures
23 August 2011 Words 6,987/ References 1,537 (total 8,524) Sustainable development of what? Contesting global development concepts and measures Su-ming Khoo School of Political Science & Sociology, National University of Ireland, Galway Introduction Whether we are trying to find out if a particular development situation is sustainable, assess a development trend for sustainability, or compare development performance of different countries or regions, we have inevitably to ask the question: sustainable development of what? This chapter explores efforts to define, measure and compare aspects of development at the global level. The starting point is the proposition that the meanings and definitions of sustainable development are neither static, nor given. Sustainable development has been called a contestable concept, containing competing interpretations and ideas (Jacobs 1991). ‘Sustainability’ is a boundary term, signifying complex interactions between science, politics, policymaking and development (Scoones 2010, 153-4). ‘Development’ is similarly emergent and contested, with different understandings emerging over time and space. This fluidity has allowed different actors to redefine and manipulate the term ‘sustainable development’ to suit their own agendas (Krueger & Gibb 2007, 8). Sustainable development must gain intellectual clarity and rigour and give up politically expedient fuzziness, if it is to have an impact (Lélé 1991, 607). The conceptual and empirical challenges converge in concerns with measurement - ‘if sustainability is to mean anything, it must be measurable’ (Hamilton & Atkinson 2006, xi). Debates about the meaning and measurement of sustainable development are usually situated within efforts to ‘green’ national accounting. These debates appear somewhat technical, but questions concerning what measures to choose and how to integrate different measures reflect profound, even radical efforts to redefine how societies think about, and value, social progress and wealth. -
On the Economics of Ecosystem Services
On the Economics of Ecosystem Services Draft 2 Huib Silvis en Martijn van der Heide Commissioned by the Netherlands WOT Natuur en Milieu 1. Introduction 1.1 Objectives 1.2 Context 1.3 Structure of this report 2. Classification of ecosystem services 2.1 Introduction 2.2 Typology of ecosystem services 2.3 Ecosystem services and ecosystem dis-services 3. From pre-classical economics to modern economics 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Pre-classical economics 3.3 Classical economics 3.4 Neo-classical economics 3.5 Modern economics 4. Insights from environmental and ecological economics 4.1 Introduction 4.2 Reasoning of environmental economics 4.3 Market failures 4.4 Criticisms from ecological economics 5. Valuation of ecosystem services 5.1 Introduction 5.2 Categories of values and the concept of total economic value 5.3 Monetary valuation ecosystem services 6. Policy analysis and design 6.1 Tools 6.2 Cost-Effectiveness Analysis (CEA) 6.3 Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) 6.4 Multi Criteria Analysis (MCA) 6.5 Safe minimum standards approach and the precautionary principle 6.6 Design References Annex: Methods for valuing ecosystem services 1 1. Introduction 1.1 Objectives In economic terms ecosystems must be regarded as a special form of capital assets. Like reproducible capital assets (roads, buildings, and machinery), ecosystems depreciate if they are misused or are overused. But ecosystems differ from reproducible capital assets in several ways. Depreciation of natural capital may be irreversible, or the systems take a long time to recover. Generally speaking, it isn’t possible to replace a depleted or degraded ecosystem by a new one. -
Daniel S. Karp
Daniel S. Karp Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology University of California, Davis 1071 Academic Surge One Shields Ave Davis, CA 95616-8627 email: [email protected] office phone: (530) 752-2108 website: http://karp.ucdavis.edu CURRENT POSITION Assistant Professor, University of California Davis Department of Wildlife, Fish, & Conservation Biology PREVIOUS POSITION Killam Postdoctoral Fellow, The University of British Columbia Institute for Resources, Environment, and Sustainability Advisor: Kai Chan NatureNet Science Fellow, The Nature Conservancy & UC Berkeley Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management Advisors: Claire Kremen, Mary Ruckelshaus, and Peter Kareiva EDUCATION 2009-2013 PhD, Biology- Ecology and Evolution, Stanford University GPA 4.25/4.00 Advisor: Gretchen Daily 2005—2009 BS, Biology- Ecology and Evolution Track, Stanford University BS, Earth Systems- Biosphere Concentration, Stanford University GPA 4.03/4.00 Advisors: Terry Root and Rodolfo Dirzo CURRENT RESEARCH Earth is experiencing more rapid changes now than at any time in the past ten thousand years. I am investigating the resulting trajectories of change in biodiversity and Earth’s life-support systems. Looking forward, a key challenge for humanity is to increase food production, while at the same time securing other vital societal benefits from rural landscapes. Meeting this challenge requires improved understanding of how agricultural practices affect yields, biodiversity, and ecosystem services. My research thus focuses on developing methods for reconciling conservation activities with food production practices. My research program has four aspects. First, I develop and apply ecological theory to understanding and managing biodiversity in working landscapes. Second, I quantify the effects of alternative agricultural practices on biodiversity-mediated ecosystem services. -
Taylor Ricketts' CV
TAYLOR H. RICKETTS GUND INSTITUTE FOR ENVIRONMENT P ( 8 0 2 ) 6 5 6 - 7796 UNIVERSITY OF VERMON T TAYLOR.RICK [email protected] 617 MAIN STREET RICKETTSLAB.COM BURLINGTON, VT 0 5 4 0 5 AREAS OF INTEREST Community and landscape ecology, ecosystem services, ecological economics, conservation biology, environmental policy, biogeography PROFESSIONAL APPOINTMENTS University of Vermont Director, Gund Institute for Environment 2017-present Director, Gund Institute for Ecological Economics 2011-2017 Gund Professor, Rubenstein School for Natural Resources & Environ. 2011-present World Wildlife Fund – USA Senior Fellow 2011-2016 Managing Director, Conservation Science Program 2008-2011 Director, Conservation Science Program 2002-2008 University of Maryland, Department of Biology 2003-2011 Adjunct Assistant Professor Stanford University 2000-2002 Post-doctoral researcher, Biological Sciences Zegrahm Expeditions 1991-1995 Lecturer and Expedition Leader for remote nature tours EDUCATION Stanford University: Ph.D. in Biological Sciences 2000 (Committee: Paul Ehrlich, Gretchen Daily, Hal Mooney, Peter Vitousek) Dartmouth College: B.A. magna cum laude in Earth Sciences, Environ. Studies 1991 PUBLICATIONS Books Fisher, B., R. Naidoo, T.H. Ricketts (2014). A field guide to economics for conservationists. Roberts & Co. 185 pp. Kareiva, P., H. Tallis, T.H. Ricketts, G.C. Daily, & S. Polasky, eds. (2011). Natural capital: Theory and practice of mapping ecosystem services. Oxford University Press. 432 pp. National Research Council of the National Academies (2006). Status of pollinators in North America. National Academies Press, Washington, D.C. 322 pp. Burgess, N. D., J. A. D’ Amico Hales, E. Underwood, E. Dinerstein, D. Olson, J. Schipper, T.H. Ricketts, I. Itoua and K. -
Empower Women, Save the Planet? Science, Strategy, and Population-Environment Advocacy
Empower Women, Save the Planet? Science, Strategy, and Population-Environment Advocacy By Jade Sasser A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Environmental Science, Policy & Management in the Graduate Division of the University of California, Berkeley Committee in charge: Professor Nancy Lee Peluso, Chair Professor Louise Fortmann Professor Carolyn Finney Professor Lawrence Cohen Spring 2012 Empower Women, Save the Planet? Science, Strategy, and Population-Environment Advocacy © 2012 by Jade Sasser Abstract Empower Women, Save the Planet? Science, Strategy, and Population-Environment Advocacy by Jade Sasser Doctor of Philosophy in Environmental Science, Policy, and Management University of California, Berkeley Professor Nancy Peluso, Chair This dissertation is about the problems of global population and women’s fertility as constructed, circulated and contested among a network of American environmental actors. The first decade of the new millennium witnessed an upsurge in environmentalist attention to population trends, particularly in the context of widespread attention to climate change. Using ethnographic research conducted among a network of U.S. foreign aid donors, environmental, population and family planning NGO managers, and college youth activists, this dissertation asks the questions: What- and who- is driving the renewed focus on population growth as a driver of ecological crisis? What strategies are being used to drive a linked population-environment development agenda forward, and what effects do these strategies have on population science, policy, and political debates? I argue that, rather than reprise familiar neo-Malthusian arguments, these actors draw on scientific knowledge and social justice frameworks, to position population- environment advocacy in the realm of progressive politics.