Teaching and Learning Ecosystem Assessment and Valuation (original) (raw)
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Löw Beer 2018: Teaching and Learning Ecosystem Assessment and Valuation
Teaching and Learning Ecosystem Assessment and Valuation, 2018
There has been very little research on teaching, learning and communicating core concepts from Ecological and Environmental Economics. Yet, shedding light on these issues is important for more effective teaching, and to support the public debate on ideas, which aim to shape a sustainable future. This paper investigates teaching and learning about one of the most researched, applied and contested concepts in Environmental and Ecological Economics: Ecosystem Assessment and Valuation (ESAV). It presents students’ conceptions on ESAV gained through group discussions. The transcripts were analyzed with the phenomenographic and documentary method. The analysis focuses both on the way students describe ecological, social and economic aspects, and on the criteria they use to make political and management decisions. The main results are that students tend to see nature as a place for recreation and wildlife, do not see knowledge as uncertain and hardly bring up the idea of an economic valuation. Based on students’ conceptions, as well as research from Ecological and Environmental Economics and Economics Education, I suggest a curriculum for ESAV.
2016
We are increasingly confronted with severe social and economic impacts of environmental degradation all over the world. From a valuation perspective, environmental problems and conflicts originate from trade-offs between values. The urgency and importance to integrate nature's diverse values in decisions and actions stand out more than ever. MARK Benefits of nature Quality of life Participation Social and environmental justice Decision support Valuation, in its broad sense of 'assigning importance', is inherently part of most decisions on natural resource and land use. Scholars from different traditions-while moving from heuristic interdisciplinary debate to applied transdisciplinary science-now acknowledge the need for combining multiple disciplines and methods to represent the diverse set of values of nature. This growing group of scientists and practitioners share the ambition to explore how combinations of ecological, socio-cultural and economic valuation tools can support real-life resource and land use decision-making. The current sustainability challenges and the ineffectiveness of single-value approaches to offer relief demonstrate that continuing along a single path is no option. We advocate for the adherence of a plural valuation culture and its establishment as a common practice, by contesting and complementing ineffective and discriminatory single-value approaches. In policy and decision contexts with a willingness to improve sustainability, integrated valuation approaches can be blended in existing processes, whereas in contexts of power asymmetries or environmental conflicts, integrated valuation can promote the inclusion of diverse values through action research and support the struggle for social and environmental justice. The special issue and this editorial synthesis paper bring together lessons from pioneer case studies and research papers, synthesizing main challenges and setting out priorities for the years to come for the field of integrated valuation.
Ecology and valuation: Big changes needed
Ecological Economics, 2007
Ecological Economics has developed as a "transdisciplinary science," but it has not taken significant steps toward a truly integrated process of evaluating anthropogenic ecological change. The emerging dominance within ecological economics of the movement to monetize "ecological services," when combined with the already well-entrenched dominance of contingent pricing as a means to evaluate impacts on amenities, has created a "monistic" approach to valuation studies. It is argued that this monistic approach to evaluating anthropogenic impacts is inconsistent with a sophisticated conception of ecology as a complex science that rests on shifting metaphors. An alternative, pluralistic and iterative approach to valuation of anthropogenic ecological change is proposed.
Ascribing value to ecological processes: an economic view of environmental change
Forest Ecology and Management, 1999
Decisions made by individual landowners and public land managers can have a significant impact on the rates of ecological change. Interdisciplinary cooperation is desirable if economists and ecologists are to correctly interpret the impacts of individual choices for landscape management. This paper reports results fkom two studies of the residents of North Carolina which contrast individual preferences for utilitarian forest benefits and financial returns with less tangible benefits of forest amenities and ecosystem stability. One study reports preliminary tidings from a forest-benefit mail survey on @e Nantahala 'and Pisgah National Forests; the second study presents an analysis of harvest decisions by private landowners. Economic methods pertinent to valuation of environmental goods are briefly considered. Individual behavior is described which suggests that segments of the public recognize welfare benefits specikally from forest amenities, and from 'natural' production of environmental goods and services. The two studies suggest how economic tools may be extended to help quantify complex social and biological values associated with ecological processes. 0 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
Routledge Ecosystem Services Handbook: Deliberative and non-monetary valuation
There is an increasing interest in methods that can understand our values of ecosystem services in broad and multidimensional way. This chapter discusses a range of deliberative, analytical-deliberative, psychological and interpretive approaches to value the environment. Deliberative methods allow people to ponder, debate and negotiate their values, which can inform, moralise and democratise the valuation process. Analytical-deliberative approaches combine deliberative methods with more formal decision-support tools. Interpretive methods help us understand the narratives of places and what they mean to us as individuals and to our communities and culture. Psychological methods can survey the multi-faceted nature of how ecosystem services contribute to human well-being, and can also investigate our deeper held, 'transcendental' values. The way we approach valuation impacts on the type of values that are highlighted. Embracing values as a pluralistic concept means that, to comprehensively value ecosystem services, we need to embrace a diversity of methods to assess them.
Comparison of methods for the valuation of the nature education ecosystem service
2021
Nature education is one of the many services that ecosystems provide to societies as a cultural service. Whereas some valuation principles for several ecosystem services are already rather well-developed, not much attention has been paid to the principles of valuation of the provisioning of nature education as an ecosystem service. The System of Environmental-Economic Accounting –Ecosystem Accounting (SEEA EA) dvoes not provide detailed guidelines and recommendations on the topic. Therefore, several questions regarding the definition, scope and methods for quantification of this service have been considered in work we carry out currently. The topic was already discussed at a London Group meeting in 2019 and since then we have worked on the topic and would suggest possible valuation methodology.
Deliberative and Non-Monetary Valuation: Routledge Handbook of Ecosystem Services
2015
This article has been accepted for publication following peer review. However, it does not include final corrections and editorial revisions and thus there may be differences between this version and the published version. This version is under copyright by the author(s) and/or their institutions and distributed under a CC-BY-NC-ND license.