The Value of Nature and the Nature of Value

Abstract

Ecosystems are capital assets: When properly managed, they yield a flow of vital goods and services. Relative to other forms of capital, however, ecosystems are poorly understood, scarcely monitored, and--in many important cases--undergoing rapid degradation. The process of economic valuation could greatly improve stewardship. This potential is now being realized with innovative financial instruments and institutional arrangements.

Reconnecting to the Biosphere

“…Measurement of incremental values works best when the increments are small, so that a change in one service will have minimal feedbacks through the rest of the system. Such conditions are difficult to meet for many ecosystem services (Daily et al 2000). The likelihood of shifts between states makes the task of finding accounting prices for natural capital difficult since they may change in discontinuous ways (Crépin et al 2011b).…”

Re-establishing an ecological discourse in the policy debate over how to value ecosystems and biodiversity

“…Two highly controversial studies, both with natural scientists as lead authors, have made claim to have assessed the monetary value of the World's ecosystems (Costanza et al, 1997) and all remaining wild Nature (Balmford et al, 2002). In the United States, the ecosystems services approach has been promoted, amongst others, by ecologists Paul Ehrlich and his student Gretchen Daily (e.g., Daily, 1997;Daily et al, 2000). The services approach perceives of an entity having value only in as far as it has a productive, service providing, role to play in the economy.…”

“…Ecologists and conservation biologist have for some time been engaging in the realm of economic discourse both in terms of the subject matter, its language and concepts (e.g., Daily et al, 2000). Increasingly, Nature has become capital, ecosystem structure and functions have become goods and services, and what was valued in its own right requiring protection has become instrumental for providing consumers with utility.…”

Multiple-perspective Reorganisation of the Dairy sector: Mathematical Programming Approach

“…These are in general known as (mathematical) models that link different disciplines in order to answer multi-dimensional questions about the organisation of agricultural production systems (Flichman et al, 2012). Bio-economic models as analytical tools that support the decision-making process need to embrace comprehensive economic evaluation with the limitations and requirements of the natural environment (Daily et al, 2000). However the integration of biophysical and economic components in technical and conceptual sense still remains the most significant challenge in this field (Flichman et al,2012;Gasparatos et al 2009, Gasparatos et al,2012).…”