Interim Report - TEEB

Map 1.1: Environmental conflicts
Conflict intensity
Diplomatic crisis
Protests (partly violent)
Use of violence (national scope)
Systematic/collective violence
Conflict cause
Water
Land/soil
Fish
Biodiversity
Source: WBGU, 2008
sanitation, and reducing the human health impacts of
environmental degradation (OECD 2008).
The pressures have intensified even in the short time since
the publication of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessments in
2005. In 2007, more people were living in urban than rural
areas for the first time in human history. During 2007 and
2008, the push to develop biofuels resulted in massive
changes in land use and a steep increase in the price
of some staple food crops. Continuing high rates of economic
growth in some of the large developing economies
have resulted in demand outstripping supply for several
commodities, putting even greater pressure on natural
systems. Recent evidence of climate change suggests
much faster and deeper impacts than previously predicted,
including the risk of human conflicts caused by competition
for biodiversity resources and ecosystem services
(WBGU 2008).
Such trends may change our relationship with nature but not
our reliance on it. Natural resources, and the ecosystems that
provide them, underpin our economic activity, our quality of
life and our social cohesion. But the way we organize our
economies does not give sufficient recognition to the
dependent nature of this relationship – there are no
economies without environments, but there are
environments without economies.
There have been many attempts to fill this gap by putting
some kind of monetary value on ecosystem services. Such
approaches can be helpful, but above all we need to regain
a sense of humility about the natural world. As traditional
peoples have long understood, we must ultimately answer to
nature, for the simple reason that nature has limits and rules
of its own.
We are consuming the world’s biodiversity and ecosystems
at an unsustainable rate and this is already starting to have
serious socio-economic impacts. If we are to find solutions
to the problems we face, we need to understand what is
happening to biodiversity and ecosystems and how these
changes affect the goods and services they provide. We then
need to look at the way we can use economic tools to ensure
that future generations can continue to enjoy the benefits of
these goods and services.
This is a highly complex challenge, but one which must be
met. However, lessons from the last 100 years demonstrate
that mankind has usually acted too little and too late in face
of similar threats – asbestos, CFCs, acid rain, declining
fisheries, BSE, contamination of the Great Lakes and, most
recently and dramatically, climate change. Assigning just
1% of global GDP up to 2030 can achieve significant
improvements in air and water quality and human health,
and ensure progress toward climate targets. As the OECD
has observed: “You can call it the cost of insurance” (OECD
2008). With the benefit of hindsight, we recognize the
mistakes that we have made in the past and we can learn
from them (EEA 2001).
Biodiversity and ecosystems today
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