Valuing Ecosystem Services


Book Description

Nutrient recycling, habitat for plants and animals, flood control, and water supply are among the many beneficial services provided by aquatic ecosystems. In making decisions about human activities, such as draining a wetland for a housing development, it is essential to consider both the value of the development and the value of the ecosystem services that could be lost. Despite a growing recognition of the importance of ecosystem services, their value is often overlooked in environmental decision-making. This report identifies methods for assigning economic value to ecosystem servicesâ€"even intangible onesâ€"and calls for greater collaboration between ecologists and economists in such efforts.







Economics of Coastal and Water Resources: Valuing Environmental Functions


Book Description

Most of the chapters in this volume are authored by staff or associates of the Centre for Social and Economic Research on the Global Environment (CSERGE). CSERGE is a research centre sponsored by the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), which specialises in interdisciplinary work focussed on environmental management issues. Weare grateful for the long term support that we have received from the ESRC. We would also like to acknowledge the efforts of Ann Dixon and SHin Pearce in the preparation of this volume. vii INTRODUCTION CHAPTER 1. ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS AND COASTAL ZONE ECOSYSTEMS' VALUES: AN OVERVIEW. Turner, R. K. , Bateman, I. J. and Adger, W. N. 1. 1 Coastal zone pressure and sustainable management challenges Given the continued intensification of the process of globalisation - involving population growth, population density changes via urbanisation, industrial development, increased trade and capital flows, liberalisation of transnational corporation activity and lifestyle and attitudinal changes - coastal zones and their hydrologically linked catchment areas have come under heavy environmental pressure. The scale and extent of socio-economic activities have profound implications for the now coevolving natural and human systems and their complex interrelationships (Turner, Perrings and Folke, 1997). The consequences of this process of change manifest themselves across a range of spatial and temporal scales. Indeed the juxtaposition of different spatial, functional and temporal scales that is inherent in the catchment-coastal ecosystems-seas/oceans continuum poses particularly difficult challenges for both science and resource management/governance.




The Measurement of Environmental and Resource Values


Book Description

First Published in 2003. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.




Estimating Economic Values for Nature


Book Description

Estimating Economic Values for Nature presents, in one volume, a collection of V. Kerry Smith's papers prepared over 25 years dealing with the theory and practice of non-market valuation for environmental resources. Taken together, the papers explore the conceptual basis, the implementation process and empirical performance of all available methods of measuring economic values for the services of nature and how these values are constructed from people's choices. The issues discussed in this volume include travel cost recreation demand, averting behaviour, household production, hedonic property value, hedonic wage and contingent valuation methods. These essays describe what has been learned from past benefit analysis, using meta-analysis, as well as the issues at the frontier of current research in the area. This important volume will be welcomed by environmental and public economists, as well as practitioners of cost-benefit analysis, as an authoritative and comprehensive discussion of non-market valuation.







Marine Ecosystem Services


Book Description

Marine Ecosystem Services (MARECOS) is an interdisciplinary study that provides relevant information for national, Nordic and international ecosystem services assessments and valuation in the implementation of marine policy. This report aims to provide suggestions on how ecosystem condition assessments, being based on the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD), and the HELCOM indicator based assessments for the Baltic Sea, could be used for the assessment of ecosystem services. By describing the potentials of linking data and knowledge describing the status of marine ecosystems and water quality to the values of the services and goods provided, the report offers useful information for policy and decision makers in the domain of the marine and aquatic policies around the Baltic and in the Nordic countries.




Environmental Value Transfer: Issues and Methods


Book Description

This volume offers a snapshot of the research that is ongoing in the area of value transfer. It provides relevant input for increasing the quality of cost-benefit analyses of projects with environmental and health impacts. The volume includes papers by some of the most influential authors in the area and covers the latest developments in the field.