Approach for reporting on ecosystem services - BIP Indicators

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Sustainability Reporting Today: The Readers’ VerdictBox 1: The complexity of impacts and dependenciesTypically, impacts and dependencies are tied to the activities of an organization and its stakeholders, canbe the result of single (such as tree felling) or multiple (such as infrastructure development) actions, and areoften the result of cumulative actions and effects. There<strong>for</strong>e, it can be difficult <strong>for</strong> individual organizationsto isolate them.Impacts can be categorized as follows:• Direct impact – including excessive water use reducing water availability <strong>for</strong> all users in the area,pollution reducing numbers of pollinators, and carbon emissions affecting climate regulation.• Indirect or secondary impact – including impacts resulting from direct effects of activities, such as wateruse causing a change in river flow that indirectly affects mangroves, leading to a loss of flood defence.Other examples include immigration to certain areas as a result of the availability of jobs or roads,leading to an increase in bushmeat hunting reducing wildlife populations. Indirect impacts also refer toeffects further up or down the value chain of an organization - a trader in wood, <strong>for</strong> example, may itselfcause little impact on the provision of ES but its activities cause impacts to occur elsewhere, such asincreased demand potentially leading to unsustainable de<strong>for</strong>estation.• Cumulative impact – impacts that occur in conjunction with other parties’ actions. Examples includeclimate change as a result of cumulative GHG emissions, and water scarcity caused by a number o<strong>for</strong>ganizations using water from the same aquifer.Dependency can be categorised as follows:• Direct dependence – natural resources needed or used <strong>for</strong> an organization’s operations (e.g., fresh wateravailability, timber products).• Indirect or secondary dependence – many of the regulating and supporting services will indirectlybenefit organizations (e.g., oceanic nutrient cycling essential to fish productivity, flood defence toinfrastructure provided by a mangrove ecosystem). Moreover, indirect or secondary dependence refersto ES depended upon by supply chain partners, <strong>for</strong> example natural resources on which key suppliersdepend.The above impacts and dependencies can result in both linear and non-linear changes:• Linear change – whereby changes to the provision of ES occur as a direct, straight<strong>for</strong>ward consequenceof a change in pressure produced by an organization, <strong>for</strong> example water quality declines with anincreased level of effluent output.• Non-linear change – whereby increases in pressure from an organization cause changes to the provisionof ES in a more convoluted fashion. For example, changes only occur once a threshold of pressure isreached, often known as ‘tipping points’, which could lead to ecosystem collapse that is prohibitivelyexpensive or even irreversible. Eutrophication is a good example of a non-linear ecosystem change.Box 1 provides a synopsis of the differing <strong>for</strong>ms that impacts and dependencies may take.16© 2011 GRI
It should be realised <strong>for</strong> both dependencies andimpacts that:• These relationships are not mutuallyexclusive: more than one of the aboverelationships can take place at the sametime. In fact, an organization’s dependenceon a service may also lead to an impact,although this is not always the case. Also,many of the direct impacts will lead toindirect impacts to occur. Reduced wateravailability leading to a loss of habitat andassociated services is one example.• All of these can occur over differentgeographical scales, from local to globalimpacts and dependencies, as well as overdifferent timeframes.• All of these can occur throughout the valuechain, from production and manufacturingthrough to consumption and disposal.ResponsesImpacts and dependencies may move anorganization to undertake actions that changeits relationship to ecosystems and their services.Responses comprise all actions organizations takein relation to their linkages with ES. For example, anorganization may implement mitigation measuresto reduce negative impacts on ES as well as tomaintain the capacity of ecosystems to renderservices, especially when an organization dependson specific ES. Apart from reducing a negativeimpact, an organization may also want to promotepositive effects on ES through the adoption ofsustainable management systems, or undertakingof specific initiatives such as payments <strong>for</strong>environmental services (PES) schemes. An exampleof the latter is when an organization reimburses<strong>for</strong>est owners or farmers <strong>for</strong> their contributions toconserve ES the organization uses. Responses canalso include actions to adjust activities in order toshift away from the use of certain ES, <strong>for</strong> examplebecause these ES are in decline.The relationships between organizations and ESare numerous and are illustrated in Figure 3. Thefigure follows the flow of how combined pressuresof an organization and other stakeholders, aswell as natural causes, drive changes to the stockFigure 3. The linkages between organizationsand ecosystem services. The organization and otherstakeholders generate pressures that can impact thestock and flow of ES. They also derive benefits from ESin the <strong>for</strong>m of provisioning, cultural services, supportingand regulating services. ES stock and flow can also beimpacted by natural causes of change, as well as by theresponses of the organization.and flow of ES. At the same time, an organizationand other stakeholders are drawing upon ES <strong>for</strong>their own activities (NB: ES impacted throughoperational pressures are not necessarily the sameES an organization depends upon). Organizationsrespond to changes in ES through a range ofmeans (such as impact mitigation strategies,substitution strategies to reduce dependency). Eachof these relationships provides an opportunity <strong>for</strong>developing metrics and indicators and these aredetailed below (the numbers corresponding tothose in Figure 3):1. Organizational pressures. These consist of allpressures that an organization places on ES,including usage, discharge, and other activitiesthat result in ecological changes (e.g., habitatclearance, introduction of invasive species).2. Pressures of other stakeholders (usage,discharge, other activities that result inecological changes).17GRI Research andDevelopment SeriesI Research & Development<strong>Approach</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>reporting</strong> on ecosystem services– Incorporating ecosystem services into an organization’s per<strong>for</strong>mance disclosureTopicsReportingPractices
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Page 3 and 4: AcknowledgementGlobal Reporting Ini
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