Green Economy in a Blue World-Full Report

in a Blue World

The need for a greener economy in a blue world Harmonizing traditional economic activity and ecosystem-dependent economic values is a challenge we must address, especially for our coasts and oceans. Persistent environmental pressures, including pollution, overharvesting of fisheries, and habitat

and recreation are important reasons why so many people chose to live near the sea, either in primary residences or in second homes. Ocean recreation offers both market and non-market benefits to residents and visitors of the coasts (Pendleton, 2008). Ocean views have been shown to improve people’s well-being and are an important reason homes near the sea have higher value (Kildow, 2009).

Payment for Ecosystem Services

Nature provides ecosystem services to both humankind and to individuals, free of cost. However, conserving ecosystem services may come at a cost through the loss of revenue derived from another use. In particular, these costs are incurred by individuals who own ecosystems such as, for example, a forest in a river catchment area. Conserving the forest provides a range of services, whether it means the supply of clean water or the prevention of soil erosion. But these services are largely unrecognized or ‘invisible’ values. On the other hand, converting the forest to cropland would provide direct benefits to the landowner and beyond. These benefits may be smaller than the costs of losing the ecosystem services; but they are more visible and positively accounted for in prevailing economic models. Further, the individual landowner derives relatively

little benefit from conserving the services. PES can be a mechanism for overcoming this problem. The primary objective of a PES scheme is not to generate money but to recognize the value of ecosystem services and support their sustainable use. PES schemes incentivize ‘sellers’, or ‘service providers’ to change behaviour and encourage them to continue to provide the services, usually by compensating for losses or ‘opportunity costs.’ The ‘buyer’, or ‘service beneficiary’, may be private (a company selling bottled drinking water), public (a city supplying drinking water) or other organizations, such as an environmental group involved in the conservation of forest biodiversity. Source: GRID-Arendal, 2012: Vital Graphics on Payment for Ecosystem Services – Realising Nature’s Value

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