FEATURE - What Price Nature? Bogs US$6,000, Reefs US$10,000
Date: 10-May-06
Country: NORWAY
Author: Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent
The estimates from United Nations-backed studies are part of a fledgling bid to put a price on nature's bounties, from the production of crops, fish or timber to clean water supplies or the prevention of erosion.
Sceptics say the estimates are little better than guesswork but proponents argue that "Eco-nomics" shows natural systems, such as rainforests or mangroves, are usually worth more intact than if chopped down and harvested.
"It's not rocket science ... but it's better than thinking that ecological systems have no value at all," said Robert Costanza, professor of ecological economics at the University of Vermont.
Some scientists say Eco-nomics could help safeguard the planet's ecosystems at a time of multiple threats, ranging from global warming, deforestation and pollution to the introduction of alien species to new habitats.
"There's a lot of suspicion (about ecosystem economics) because you can't easily value these things," said Partha Dasgupta, professor of economics at Cambridge University in England.
"But I hope it takes off because we have to find a way to end destruction of nature," he said.
FREE AND LIMITLESS?
Costanza led a landmark 1997 study, published in the journal Nature, that concluded the world's ecosystems were worth US$33 trillion -- almost double world gross national product at the time. "The estimates we used were conservative," he said.
Since then economists have tried to fix price tags on swamps, deserts, glaciers, reefs or jungles to try to widen assessments of the economy away from yardsticks like housing starts or consumer spending.
"Current measures of economic wealth ... do not reflect the total economic value of ecosystems and mistakenly treat nature's goods and services as free to use and limitless in abundance," a UN report on biodiversity said in March.
It noted a country could boost conventional economic growth by felling all its forests for timber exports or by dynamiting its coral reefs to catch fish -- but added the gains would be short-lived.
Another UN report in January estimated that an intact coral reef was worth US$1,000-$6,000 per hectare per year, perhaps US$10,000 if located off a Caribbean beach resort.
Reefs provide nurseries for fish, act as protective barriers against coastal erosion from storms or tsunamis and draw tourists. Protecting a reef would cost just US$8 per hectare if it was converted to a marine park.
An international study last year, the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, valued a Canadian wetland at US$6,000 a hectare per year against about US$2,000 if converted for intensive farming.
It said a hectare of tropical forest in Cameroon was worth about US$4,000 if managed properly against US$2,000 if felled for farming. Intact mangroves in Thailand were worth US$1,000 a year against US$200 a year if converted for shrimp farming.
Jeff McNeely, chief scientist of the World Conservation Union in Geneva, said coasts with intact mangrove swamps in Thailand suffered less damage during the 2004 tsunami.
"If you look at extreme natural events in the last couple of years -- Hurricane Katrina, the tsunami, the earthquake in Kashmir -- all were more disastrous than they would have been if ecosystems had been intact," he said.
THOUGHT EXPERIMENT?
But some scientists say Eco-nomics is unlikely to become part of mainstream economic thought.
"Putting a price on ecological assets is symbolically a useful thing. But I don't think it will be economic reality in the next decades," said Hans Joachim Schnellnhuber, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany.
"It's just a thought experiment," he said, arguing that scientists should focus on raising public awareness of the likely impacts of global warming, such as higher seas, floods or desertification.
McNeely said insurance companies often provided a more accurate gauge of nature's financi
