ECOLOGY AND ECONOMY
Biodiversity is economy Biodiversity is the foundation of our lives and provides us with innumerable essential services. Many of these services are now under threat from biodiversity loss. Money spent on conserving and restoring biological diversity would be a sound economic investment.
The human population effectively squanders the equivalent of 75 000 000 000 Swiss francs each year as a result of our failure to control biodiversity loss and the increasing pressure on Earth’s ecosystems. This is the conclusion of a team of scientists who have studied how much humans benefit from ecosystems and the species that inhabit them. Key ecosystem services are the storage of CO2, especially by forests and peatlands, and the provision of drinking water, food and medicines (see summary on page 11). The engine that drives the provision of these services is biodiversity. No life without biodiversity. If ecosystems are damaged or destroyed, they can no longer provide their services. Humans must then either accept
versity; we need to view the markets for traded goods and services as a subdivision of a much higher-level economy, the economy of the biosphere,” says Andreas Hauser. Price tags on biodiversity. The TEEB project (The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity) does just this at global level. The study, which is hosted by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), sets out to put price tags on biodiversity’s services to humankind and to assess the economic consequences of biodiversity loss. The initial findings show that the welfare loss to humankind in economic terms would amount to around 7 per cent of global gross domestic product by 2050 if biodiversity loss continues at the present rate and if the quan-
“We must learn that the ecosystems are an important form of capital Andreas Hauser, FOEN that produces goods and provides services.” a serious reduction in quality of life or use expensive and complex technology to replace these services. “We must learn that the ecosystems are an important form of capital that produces goods and provides services”, says Andreas Hauser of the Economics Section at the Swiss Federal Office for the Environment (FOEN). Nevertheless, it is impossible to put a figure on the economic value of biodiversity as a whole. “Since we cannot live without biodiversity, its value is infinitely high,” explains Andreas Hauser. Economic valuations therefore relate to the loss or added value of services when two different situations are compared. However, many ecosystem services are not traded on the open market. While everyone knows that a kilo of potatoes has a price in the shops, processes such as the creation of fertile soil or the pollination of crops are assumed to be free. “It is important for us to become more aware of the benefits that we derive from biodi-
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tity of goods and services that biodiversity can provide continues to decline. “The cost of the damage would spiral and very rapidly reach thousands of billions,” says Andreas Hauser. Studies in Switzerland likewise show that near-natural ecosystems are of greater economic value than low-biodiversity ecosystems. But in many cases what is worthwhile for society as a whole is not profitable for the individual landowner. Because of this, many services which deserve to be valued and treasured are quietly destroyed. The three following pieces illustrate the importance of biodiversity for everyday life in connection with food, health and security. In each case the core message is the same: the conservation of biodiversity is not a luxury but an existential necessity. Gregor Klaus www.environment-switzerland.ch/mag2010-2-03
CONTACT Andreas Hauser Economics Section FOEN +41 (0)31 322 79 15 andreas.hauser@bafu.admin.ch
environment 2/2010 > Biodiversity