Paradigm shifts in conservation biology

A perspective piece in the latest Science by G. Mace talks about the shifts of framing and purpose of conservation.  According to the author, there have been four main phases in the modern framing of conservation in the developed world (figure above), and "People and nature" is where we are right now.  Moving away from "Nature for people," an overly utilitarian paradigm, this new model emphasizes the two-way, mulch-layered and multidimensional relationships between people and nature. One concern of this latest paradigm though is that it lacks the analytical foundations that made the earlier ones both deliverable and measurable.

The Marriage between science and values

'Scientific knowledge reveals options. Values determine choices." 

Journalist A. Revkin shares his insights about the roles of science and values when reporting the Pope's recent effort to tackles sustainability during a workshop on "Sustainable humanity, sustainable nature: Our responsibility."

How to make hard choices -- a philosopher's suggestion

One of my research interests is to help people make better decisions, but in this TED talk Ruth Chang says there is not necessarily a better decision/alternative.  Apart from being better, worse or equal, an alternative could also be "on a par" with another.  The choices are hard because the alternatives on a par are in the same neighborhood of value, in the same league of value, while at the same time being very different in kind of value.

Hard choices are a godsend, because a world full of easy choices only would enslave us to reasons, according to Ruth.  In making hard decisions, she suggests us to put our very selves behind an option and create reasons, instead of drifting and allowing the world to write the story of our lives. 

If you have to toss a coin--create your own rule!

TESSA: An ecosystem services valuation tool for non-expert use at a local level

A UK effort jointly developed by six institutions.  TESSA fits the gap for 'rapid appraisal' of ecosystem services that do not require substantial resources or specialist technical knowledge.  It is designed for local non-specialists. The figure above from this paper shows TESSA's methodological framework. 

Bringing ecosystem services into integrated water resources management

I just realize I have never used this blog to promote my own work!  Um, it must be due to my Chinese roots of being modest and all that...Anyway, here is my first attempt of self-promotion :).

We just published a paper in the Journal of Environmental Management on the ecosystem services work for our Murray-Darling Basin Multiple Benefits project.  The project received lots of media attention (e.g. ABC and Nature), and I was amazed by how much we achieved in six months (CSIRO report to the Murray–Darling Basin Authority).  

The key message of the paper is that we need to consider the multiple environmental benefits provided by  the river in addition to the conventional benefit of irrigation water provision.  Figure 7 in the paper summaries the message very well (thanks to Martin who came up with the cool figure!). 

The preliminary results of this work identified the sub-catchments in the river basin with the greatest potential synergies and trade-offs of ecosystem service provision under the integrated water resources management reform process.  The framework we proposed was certainly not perfect, but I see a lots of potentials for further development...


.

Special issue on economic analysis of biodiversity

In Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Vol 28 (1), 2012. 

Special issue: Challenges of sustaining natural capital and ecosystem servicesQuantification, modelling & valuation/accounting

In the coming issue of Ecological Indicators, Volume 21, Pages 1-154 (October 2012)

Lies, dam lies and water plans

The wicked problem of managing the MDB is in the national and international media again lately. 

In his recent "The conversation" article, professor Lin Crase commented,

"Now that this first phase has passed, the public will be treated to the traditional jousting between states and the federal government. Sifting through fact and fiction in this jurisdictional debate will be no easier than judging the fairly simplistic cases presented by irrigators and environmentalists over the past five years. What both debates share in common are a predilection to communicate with little reference to history, scant regard to the role of uncertainty and even less attention to the cost-effectiveness of choices (referring to "the renewed enthusiasm for spending taxpayers’ money on irrigation infrastructure")."

Another economist, John Quiggin also said the infrastructure investments, which appeared to be what the government locked in to, are the most expensive way of reducing water use in irrigation.  In addition, "The big problem lies with the proposal that, instead of continuing to buy water rights irrigators who are willing to sell their entitlements, future policy should focus on engineering works designed to save water. This policy is bad for farmers, bad for the environment and bad for the community in general...."  Also, "The release of the revised proposed basin plan for the Murray-Darling brings us one step closer to the end of one of the most disastrously misconceived and mismanaged policy processes in Australian history (more details).."

Contributions of cultural services to the ecosystem services agenda

A new PNAS paper listed the types of cultural services as shown in the figure below. 

Common ground for biodiversity and ecosystem services

A BioScience paper argues biodiversity conservation is the end and ecosystem services can be a useful means to further this end in some cases.

Murray-Darling Basin Multiple Benefits Project

The final report is finally out and has received lots of media attention, including Nature and ABC. 

I worked on "Task 3: Ecosystem service outcomes of flow," and along with several colleagues, we developed a set of biological and socio-economic ES indicators for different regions of MDB. 

How to translate $/household/yr to $/ha/yr when doing spatially explicit benefit transfer?

Somebody asked me the question regarding my 2010 Environmental Management paper.   A great question and here is my answer:

"The key is to find detailed information about the survey design and figure out what is the population surveyed and how large is exactly the area studied.   Then you can calculate the total value by multiplying the per person (or per household) value and the number of people (or household).  The next step is to divide the total value by the size of the study area. 

The steps are easily said than done, of course.  Mostly because valuation studies are not designed for benefit transfer purpose, as a result, one cannot find enough information about survey designs.  This is especially the case for journal articles where authors tend to focus on the innovative side of the research and use very little ink on the survey itself.   Then you can either contact the author or track down other publications that were derived from the same survey.   A project report, for instance, often carries more detailed information about the survey. 

If you still cannot find enough after trying these two approaches, the last resort is to make you own assumptions.   One has to be extremely careful here, because this step might introduce errors.   There are two things you can do to make yourself feel less guilty.  First, to err on the safe side.  It is generally more desirable to come up with a conservative value rather than an outrageously big one.   Second, be transparent by keeping a very good note about what exactly you did."

Recreation Use Values Database for North America

"The database currently contains 352 documents of economic valuation studies that estimated the use value of recreation activities in the U.S. and Canada from 1958 to 2006, totaling 2,703 estimates in per person per activity day, adjusted to 2010 USD...An overview of the database is provided in pdf format, including distributions of estimates and studies, and mean values by activity type by region.”

HT: R Rosenberger via Resecon list. 

Social Values for Ecosystem Services (SolVES)

A USGS effort and here are the list of their social values from the journal article describing their approach.


HT: K Bagstad via GIEE list