Mainstreaming Natural Capital and Ecosystem Services into Development Policy

This book highlights the latest advances in the science and practice of using ecosystem services to inform decisions for economic development in the context of the developing countries.

The development of the ecosystem services paradigm has enhanced our understanding of natural capital as an indispensable form of capital asset along with produced and human capital. This book addresses what could be the possible pathways to mainstream natural capital assets into development policies and what is currently known about the economic values of ecosystem services. A series of innovative tools to help policy makers and planners account for natural capital and ecosystem services in sectoral and macroeconomic policies have been explored and their application at the national and regional scale has been demonstrated. Several detailed case studies are presented in which the understanding of ecosystem services values has successfully informed decisions, including examples from Chile, South Africa, Tanzania, Trinidad and Tobago, Vietnam and the Aral Sea in Central Asia. These provide the critically important insights, lessons learned and means and mechanisms for policy makers to incentivize protection and discourage degradation of ecosystems and the services they provide.

Mainstreaming Natural Capital and Ecosystem Services into Development Policy is designed to help decision makers at all levels, including governments, businesses, multilevel development banks and individuals to integrate ecosystems and their services into their decision making.

1. Introduction 2. Strategic Environmental Assessment as a tool to mainstream ecosystem services in planning 3. Lessons for mainstreaming ecosystem services into policy and practice from South Africa 4 .Linking growth and natural capital in the Republic of Kazakhstan: A case study of Aral Sea 5. Mapping the cultural services of ecosystems and heritage sites in the Usumacinta floodplain in Mexico 6. Building Consensus through Assessment Evidence from San Pedro de Atacama, Chile 7. Integrating natural capital and ecosystem services into policy and decision making in Trinidad and Tobago 8. Nature’s Services Facilitate National Green Growth Strategy: Vietnam 2025 9. The contribution of Forest Ecosystems in the Tanzanian Economy 10. Natural Capital and GDP of the Poor in Vietnam 11. Natural Capital and the Rate of Discount

Pushpam Kumar is Chief Environmental Economist and Senior Economic Advisor, UN Environment Programme. He works on the issues of Inclusive Wealth Index, Natural Capital, Climate Change, Environmental Burden of Disease, Human Capital and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).