Why measure biodiversity values in economic terms?

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Why measure biodiversity values in economic terms?

• Dr. V.B. Mathur
• Dean, Faculty of Wildlife Sciences
• Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun
• vbm_at_wii.gov.in

Pre-meeting training course IAIA 08 Perth,
Australia
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The Context

• Environmental and natural resource degradation
  can be caused by both too little and too much
  economic development.
• A trade off needs to be made between
  environmental conservation and developmental
  imperatives.
• This can be achieved by incorporating cost
  effective measures to restore, sustain and
  protect natural systems and maintain
  environmental quality in all stages of project
  planning, implementation and operation.

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Why is biodiversity valuable?

• Human well-being is dependent both on strong
  economy and healthy natural environment.
• Biodiversity is a natural capital on which
  societies depend for economic growth.
• Biodiversity is also intrinsic to the values of
  beauty and tranquility.

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Why should we value biodiversity?
Historically, biodiversity has been undervalued
in development processes

• Biodiversity is seen as having few benefits and
  its loss is seen as having few costs.
• We need to understand what biodiversity
  contributes to economic activity and society?
• We also need to understand what are the benefits
  and costs of an intervention that alters the
  ecosystem (e.g. development project).

more
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Why should we value biodiversity?

• How are costs and benefits of a change in
  ecosystem distributed?
• Valuation can put biodiversity in the right
  frame and focus.
• The approach should therefore be to measure
  biodiversity values market these values.
• The biodiversity market will then drive its
  management towards sustainability.

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Biodiversity Values
Use Values
Non-Use Values
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Costs, Benefits Conservation
http//biodiversityeconomics.org/
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Costs, Benefits Conservation
http//biodiversityeconomics.org/
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Costs, Benefits Conservation
Key Issues

• Who gains and who loses from a project/ activity?
• How can we re-distribute losses and gains?

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What does valuation tells us?

• It provides a sum-total of economic benefits
  and costs of biodiversity conservation.
• At varying time periods as valuation are not
  static
• Under differential management and economic
  conditions
• Under varying landuse and investment options
• It indicates the status of biodiversity.
• Whether is being degraded or lost and at what
  rate?
• It also points to the need for applying better
  economic policies and instruments for ensuring
  human well-being.

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Applications and limitations of biodiversity
valuation.

• It highlights costs and benefits and cost
  bearers and beneficiaries that in the past
  have been ignored.
• Valuation thus provides a set of tools that
  enable us to make better and informed decisions.
• Unfortunately, valuations generally tend to
  underestimate biodiversity values at a large
  scale as interactions are too complex to
  understand.

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Applications and limitations of biodiversity
valuation.

• When benefits relate to attributes such as human
  life, cultural or religious ethos, valuations
  raise ethical question especially when they focus
  on financial or cash benefits at the expense of
  other types of values that cannot or should not
  be valued.
• Many time valuation studies are not definitive
  and transferable between groups and locations.
  They are often based on the perception of a
  particular group at one point of time and may not
  be universally valid.

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Obstacles in biodiversity valuation

• Lack of data/ information on biophysical
  environment.
• Methodological constraints as well as accuracy of
  evaluation techniques.
• Ethical issues relating to valuing environmental
  impacts in monitoring terms.

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Key message

• It is relatively easy to spend huge money on
  valuation and yet get results that may not be
  useful and precise.
• So revisit objective of evaluation, look at
  time, budget and capacity and strengthen the
  process.

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Thank you