It's time to recognise the economic value of an ecosystem$44 trillion of economic value generation – over half the world’s GDP – is modera...
Published on by Water Network Research, Official research team of The Water Network
$44 trillion of economic value generation – over half the world’s GDP – is moderately or highly dependent on nature, yet we are losing nature at a startling speed.
A group of researchers developed the concept of Gross Ecosystem Product (GEP), which, modelled after Gross Domestic Product (GDP), uses market prices and surrogate market prices to calculate the accounting value of ecosystem goods and services.
GEP can reflect nature’s contribution to human well-being and its long-term trends can serve as an indicator of the extent and quality of local and regional ecosystems, providing a corrective or complement to more anthropocentric development.
Nature is free, yet its value can never be overstated. It gifts us with many benefits from the essentials for biological survival to the basis for economic prosperity. According to the report Nature Risk Rising published by the World Economic Forum, $44 trillion of economic value generation – over half the world’s total GDP – is moderately or highly dependent on nature.
Humans tend to take free things for granted, however, and consequently overexploit nature. The 2022 Living Planet Index (LPI) - which tracks populations of mammals, birds, fish, reptiles and amphibians - reveals an average 69% decrease in monitored wildlife populations since 1970. Startlingly, in the second it takes to say the word 'nature' we lose a forest area the size of nearly one football pitch.
This is why the whole human race must reconsider its relationship with nature and recognise the economic value of an ecosystem. The historic Kunming-Montreal Global biodiversity framework points out that all stakeholders, including governments, businesses and financial institutions, must regularly monitor, assess and transparently disclose their risks, dependencies and impacts on biodiversity.
Attached link
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2023/02/an-ecosystems-economic-value-can-now-be-measured-heres-howTaxonomy
- Economic Analysis
- Economic development