Pricing the priceless
NATURE has a value, but is it possible to put a number on it? A new report commissioned by Defra, called the UK National Ecosystem Assessment, has tried to do just that, estimating how much the natural environment contributes to the British economy. Insect pollination of crops is worth £430m a year, according to the study, while inland wetlands benefit water quality by up to £1.5 billion.
The report, carried out by ecologists, economists and sociologists, follows a growing trend for trying to put numbers on nature. This was what the Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change did in 2006. Similarly, a United Nations report last year estimated the global cost of damaging the natural environment.
The logic is that by putting a figure on the cost of degrading the planet's natural assets, they will be included in political calculations. If the environment is not ascribed a value, the risk is that the cost of damaging it is ignored. This sort of exercise should allow decision makers to prioritise more rationally.
The ambition to make people appreciate the natural world—and so seek to protect it—is laudable. Human life—intensive farming, densely populated cities—puts pressure on ecosystems. Climate change will only increase that. This new attempt to price nature should now feed in to a forthcoming white paper on the natural environment which Caroline Spelman, the environment secretary, will produce later this year.
One of the features of the UN report on the global environment was that that the range of its estimate was $2,500bn—so great as to be almost meaningless. But it is hard to be comfortable about any exact figure too, and some of the numbers in this report seem to me curiously precise—for example, that the health benefits of living with a view of green space are worth up to £300 per person per year.
Though the study talks about the “free services” that nature brings, it holds back from quantifying the overall value of this green and pleasant land. Instead, it looks at six future scenarios of sustainability and growth, and tries to map how ecosystems might be affected over the next 50 years. An unfettered drive for growth could result in an overall loss of £20.6 billion a year, it estimates, through increased emissions and a loss of green space.
Even broad estimates can help sensible decision-making. And in the long term, protecting the natural environment should cost less than depleting its resources—as well as allowing man to reap the benefits of the natural world for longer.
The logic is that by putting a figure on the cost of degrading the planet's natural assets, they will be included in political calculations. If the environment is not ascribed a value, the risk is that the cost of damaging it is ignored. This sort of exercise should allow decision makers to prioritise more rationally.
The ambition to make people appreciate the natural world—and so seek to protect it—is laudable. Human life—intensive farming, densely populated cities—puts pressure on ecosystems. Climate change will only increase that. This new attempt to price nature should now feed in to a forthcoming white paper on the natural environment which Caroline Spelman, the environment secretary, will produce later this year.
One of the features of the UN report on the global environment was that that the range of its estimate was $2,500bn—so great as to be almost meaningless. But it is hard to be comfortable about any exact figure too, and some of the numbers in this report seem to me curiously precise—for example, that the health benefits of living with a view of green space are worth up to £300 per person per year.
Though the study talks about the “free services” that nature brings, it holds back from quantifying the overall value of this green and pleasant land. Instead, it looks at six future scenarios of sustainability and growth, and tries to map how ecosystems might be affected over the next 50 years. An unfettered drive for growth could result in an overall loss of £20.6 billion a year, it estimates, through increased emissions and a loss of green space.
Even broad estimates can help sensible decision-making. And in the long term, protecting the natural environment should cost less than depleting its resources—as well as allowing man to reap the benefits of the natural world for longer.
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