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Debating Nature's Value pp 75–88Cite as

Who Should Value Nature?

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Abstract

There is currently a debate about whether nature should be valued in intrinsic ways or via economic valuation. By looking at the question of who values nature in countries in the global south this allows us to explore what might happen in practice when a diverse range of stakeholders are involved such as governments, companies, local communities and indigenous peoples. This chapter will argue that these are important issues that require further research because stakeholders have different agendas (valuation is not a neutral scientific process) and there are often power differentials at play. The chapter features interviews with key academics, consultants and indigenous leaders about how they value nature and their views on monetary and non-monetary valuation. The full interviews can be accessed at: http://whygreeneconomy.org/who-should-value-nature/

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Other scholars have also highlighted the importance of relational values alongside intrinsic and instrumental values; see Chan et al. [1] and Arias-Arévalo et al. [2].

  2. 2.

    Natural capital is the world’s stock of natural assets including geology, soil, air, water and all living things. Richard Mattison of Trucost consultancy explains the logic: “Valuing the services that ecosystems provide to the economy allows companies and governments to understand the reliance we have on nature and develop strategies to mitigate the economic consequences of environmental degradation. Natural capital accounting is an important tool for companies to measure, manage and reduce environmental impacts. It allows environmental performance to be fully integrated into management processes alongside more established business performance indicators” [3].

  3. 3.

    Pavan Sukhdev is the CEO of GIST Advisory and a United Nations Environment Programme Goodwill Ambassador. He was also study leader for The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB). The research by the TEEB project is recognised as one of the key global initiatives advocating for the economic valuation of nature.

  4. 4.

    Professor Giles Atkinson is a member of the Natural Capital Committee in the United Kingdom which was set up in 2012 as an independent advisory board to the UK government.

  5. 5.

    Davi Kopenawa Yanomami is a leading shaman and spokesman for the Yanomami people who live in the rainforests of northern Brazil and southern Venezuela. He has fought to protect Yanomami lands from illegal gold mining, among other threats, for more than 35 years and has been called the “Dalai Lama of the rainforest”.

  6. 6.

    Ecosystem services are the flows of supporting, provisioning, regulating and cultural services. Services that humans receive from nature include forests that provide timber and river basins that provide fish, ecosystems in the Amazon rainforest that regulate rainfall and capture carbon dioxide, and ecosystems that support and maintain fertile soils for agriculture. Some scholars argue that ecosystem services are co-produced; see [22, p. 246].

  7. 7.

    For an overview of this debate and how to participate, see Ecosystem Service Partnership webpage https://www.es-partnership.org/ongoing-discussion-on-the-science-publication-assessing-natures-contributions-to-people-diaz-et-al-2018/#more-9256

  8. 8.

    Thabit Jacob teaches at the University of Dodoma in Tanzania which hosted the Green Economy in the South conference in July 2014.

  9. 9.

    Teresa Pérez works for the World Rainforest Movement which was established in 1986 to work with local communities to defend their rights over their forests and territories. It is based in Uruguay.

  10. 10.

    Joan Carling is former Secretary-General Asian Indigenous Peoples Pact and member of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. Founded in 1988 the Asian Indigenous Peoples Pact has 47 members from 14 countries in Asia. Based in Thailand.

  11. 11.

    Yoni Rivas represents the Movement of Unified Farmers of Aguán (MUCA), which is a coalition working to defend land and human rights in the Aguán valley in Honduras that has seen a number of violent murders of farmers in recent years.

  12. 12.

    Richard Mattison is Chief Executive Officer at Trucost. Trucost was setup in 2000 and is a leading consultancy firm working with companies, investors, governments, academics and thought leaders to understand the economic consequences of natural capital dependency.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, UK

    Dario Kenner

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  1. Dario Kenner
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Correspondence to Dario Kenner .

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  1. Global Sustainability Institute, Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, UK

    Victor Anderson

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Kenner, D. (2018). Who Should Value Nature?. In: Anderson, V. (eds) Debating Nature's Value. Palgrave Pivot, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99244-0_10

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99244-0_10

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