WHY PROTECT ECOLOGICAL VITALITY

by Professor Howard Latin

Decade by decade, year by year, day by day, human actions are pushing irreplaceable species and ecosystems toward destruction.  Some scientists predict that vital natural systems will collapse in the near future if current exploitation trends continue, causing unprecedented levels of suffering.  Other experts refuse to accept this apocalyptic vision, but they caution that present practices waste irreplaceable resources, hamper attempts to improve standards of living in developing nations, and may impoverish future generations.  Severe ecological damage in developing countries worsens overpopulation and poverty problems, and contributes to political instability that also threatens wealthier nations.  Environmentalists normally want to preserve the environment based on ethical and aesthetic considerations, but there are many practical reasons as well why the destruction of nature is BAD for humanity.

The term "conservation of ecological vitality" means nothing more than the protection of ecosystems and species on a widespread basis. The ambiguous word "biodiversity" is commonly used to denote the same thing, but natural diversity or variability is only one dimension of maintaining ecological vitality.  When people rely on fisheries, forests, or wetlands resources, few environmentalists would agree that there is no need to be concerned about degradation of these ecological features if similar ecosystems are thriving on the other side of the world. When a threatened species exists in one location, most environmentalists would not find it acceptable to extinguish this species everywhere else.  People in all nations depend upon, benefit from, or simply appreciate the munificence of nature, and the objective of ecovitality conservation is to preserve as much of this eroding natural bounty as practicable. 

Worldwide ecological degradation has reached critical proportions and is still accelerating in many areas. The U.N.  Environment Programme predicts that one-quarter of all species will become extinct within thirty years, and the director of the Global Environment Facility recently warned that the "current rate of species extinction is probably more than a thousand times faster than at any other time in history."  Countless biologically productive and economically valuable ecosystems--tropical rainforests, temperate -growth forests, coral reefs, mangroves and other wetlands, grasslands and savannahs--have already been badly damaged and remain vulnerable to excessive exploitation.  Billions of tons of topsoil are lost each year through erosion from deforestation, over-grazing, and over-cultivation.  Marine fisheries catches have fallen every year but one since 1989 and agricultural yields are declining in many regions, while human population levels keep rising in most developing states.  Individually and cumulatively, these trends reflect global ecological degradation problems of  immense proportions and great urgency.

There are many compelling reasons for widespread conservation of nature and natural systems.  In a report assessing the relative importance of many environmental hazards, the U.S. EPA explained:

"Natural ecosystems like forests, wetlands, and oceans are extraordinarily valuable. These ecosystems contain economically valuable natural resources that feed, clothe and house the human race. They act as sinks that, to a certain extent, absorb and neutralize the pollutants generated by human activity. Although natural ecosystems-- and the linkages between them--are not completely understood, there is no doubt that over time the quality of human life declines as the quality of natural ecosystems declines. . . . . In short, human health and welfare ultimately rely upon the life support systems and natural resources provided by healthy ecosystems. Moreover, human beings are part of an interconnected and interdependent global ecosystem, and past experience has shown that change in one part of the system often affects other parts in unexpected ways. National efforts to evaluate relative environmental risks should recognize the vital links between human life and natural ecosystems.  Up to this point, they have not."

In an important article, "The Value of the World's Ecosystem Services and Natural Capital," published in Nature in 1997, a team of economists, geologists, and ecologists led by Dr. Robert Costanza of the Society for Ecological Economics synthesized more than 100 prior ecological-benefits assessments with some original computations to estimate the overall value for humanity of natural goods and services. Their analysis concluded that this value varies between $16 and $54 trillion U.S. Dollars annually and averages approximately $33 trillion per year,  nearly twice the value of the combined Gross National Products of all nations. The utility derived from natural systems and features can be substantially greater than the global GNP because many ecological benefits are not properly reflected in market prices or included in GNP calculations.

The Costanza team presented estimates for 17 categories of benefits from natural systems: (1) Atmospheric Gas Regulation, maintaining a proper mix of constituent gasses in the air; (2) Climate Regulation; (3) Disturbance Regulation, including storm protection and flood control; (4) Provision of Water, including water supplies for human uses; (5) Regulation of Water Characteristics and Flows; (6) Erosion Control; (7) Soil Formation, (8) Nutrient Recycling; (9) Waste Treatment, such as natural pollution control and detoxification; (10) Pollination; (11) Biological Control, including regulating species population levels through predation; (12) Habitat Provision for resident and migratory species, including wildlife and domesticated animals; (13) Food Production, including provision of fish, game animals, and forest products such as fruit and nuts; (14) Renewable Raw Materials, including timber and animal fodder; (15) Genetic Resources, including medicinals, pathogenic resistance traits, and ornamental species derived from genetic selection or manipulation; (16) Recreation; and (17) Cultural Benefits, a catch-all category including aesthetic, artistic, scientific, and spiritual values originating at least in part from natural qualities. Although some of these categories may overlap, and benefits from natural goods and services could be organized in a variety of other formats, this list should serve to make explicit the many ways in which people use, enjoy, and are protected by ecological vitality.

Only a few of the benefits categories identified by Costanza's team arise primarily from biological diversity or variability; most benefits flow from broad distribution of natural regulatory processes and broad dissemination of products, amenities, and experiences derived from nature. The greatest benefits, according to the Costanza study, stem from nutrient recycling effects, which are a function of  breadth rather than variability of natural processes. The authors noted that, despite many uncertainties, their assessment probably underestimates nature's value to a considerable degree.  For example, they did not include any quantitative values for the "Cultural" category in their cumulative benefits estimate, though environmentalists would identify ethical and aesthetic considerations as among their most important concerns, nor did the Costanza study include benefits arising from ecological systems that have not yet been studied in detail.  Moreover, dynamically changing, long-term processes such as global climate change are imperfectly understood, and the quantitative assessment could not reliably incorporate the potential benefits from avoidance or moderation of  the harms resulting from uncertain future effects.

The Costanza team cited several studies that tried to put a "shadow price," or calculated monetary value, on aesthetic satisfactions derived from nature by determining what people have been willing to pay to enjoy notable scenic vistas. This approach does not reach a more important and widespread form of aesthetic value: Millions of people have personal conceptions of a "good life" and "good world" that include significant interactions with nature. Many people want to live in a world that enables frequent exposures to natural surroundings and natural amenities, and they would not be satisfied with the knowledge that only a minimal portion of nature has been preserved in biodiversity enclaves while the remainder is being destroyed in pursuit of economic development. People do not have to travel to see scenic vistas in order to gain aesthetic satisfactions from the continued existence of parks, forests, wildlife species, and scenic vistas located on the other side of the world. It is, for example, impossible to understand broad public support for national and international endangered species laws except as a reflection of aesthetic, and sometimes moral, preferences for a world in which the variety of nature is preserved. Most people who support endangered species protection would not be able to identify more than a handful of the species that are actually endangered, and they have little prospect of seeing these rare species in the wild. Their aesthetic attachments are not primarily derived from the intrinsic qualities of endangered species and biomes, nor from the likelihood of personal experiences with them, but rather from the knowledge that a "good world" will continue to possess these natural features.

The Costanza study also did not quantify the "social insurance" benefits of maintaining functioning natural systems on a wide scale. One persuasive argument for global ecovitality conservation is that more than a billion people in developing countries depend upon favorable ecological conditions for sustenance, they have little margin for survival in the event of severe environmental dislocation, and the ecosystems essential to their welfare are being degraded at an appalling rate. Can the wealthy nations of the "North" rely on distressed victims in poor nations to slink away and die in silence, or will rapidly increasing ecological damage in the Third World exacerbate problems of political discord and instability for all nations? One need not agree with predictions of high-profile environmental cataclysm to recognize that progressive ecological destruction in the "South" is likely to create a creeping disaster for South and North alike. One reason why people in developed nations should contribute to protecting worldwide ecological vitality is that we all live on the same small planet and "a stitch in time saves nine" or "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure."

A related concern is that so many complex changes are now occurring in so many ways in so many areas that scientists and political decision makers have very little idea what the cumulative effects of countless non- sustainable resource exploitation practices will be. As Vice-President Al Gore cautioned in Earth in the Balance: "We are in fact conducting a massive, unprecedented--some say unethical--experiment. As we contemplate a choice between adapting to the changes we are causing and preventing those changes, we should bear in mind that our choice will bind not only ourselves but our grandchildren and their grandchildren as well. And of course many of the changes--such as the predicted extinction of half the living creatures on earth--would be irreversible." The conservation of ecological vitality represents a form of societal insurance in the sense that it may protect future generations against increased international or national instability, against unintended harmful consequences, and against the possibility that our own generation's choices may have disastrous effects over the long term.

A couple of years ago, an economist at the World Bank t me that the Bank is still concerned with ameliorating "brown environment" problems, such as water and air pollution, inadequate water supplies, and erosion or nutrient depletion of agricultural lands.  In contrast, the economist said the Bank's interest in protecting the "green environment" has waned in recent years. I cannot accept this simplistic dichotomy, which assumes the Bank possesses the capacity to discriminate between environmental dangers that directly affect human welfare and environmental damage that only affects the vitality and diversity of natural systems. As the Costanza study shows, human welfare is intimately connected with many "green environment" processes and features. Given the complexity and subtlety of  many interactions among ecosystems and biota, and pervasive scientific uncertainty about   these interactions, it is both arrogant and foolish to believe much of nature is disposable or unimportant because these parts of nature do not appear immediately, directly, obviously, essential for human welfare. In light of  countless uncertainties and potentially catastrophic consequences from tampering with nature, a policy that promotes retaining as much of nature as practicable seems more prudent than attempts to distinguish between necessary and unnecessary environmental features.

A Leopard in Hiding

Many environmentalists find repugnant the anthropocentric, utilitarian focus in economic assessments of nature's value. Some writers have argued on non-utilitarian moral grounds that our generation of humanity owes a duty of environmental protection to future generations. Other writers espouse an "ecocentric" perspective justifying environmental protection on the rationale that human beings should normally regard themselves as a part of nature, not above or outside nature.  There will never be a broad consensus among environmentalists about how much conservation is necessary or desirable, much less agreement between environmentalists and proponents of  development or other incompatible interests.  Malaria is just as natural as Mount Everest, and the  plasmodium falciparum parasite may appear just as attractive under a microscope as a warthog in the bush.  Yet, even the most extreme environmentalist is unlikely to advocate preservation of malaria and its mosquito carriers.  Line-drawing and interest- balancing are inescapable in environmental policy making, and people must reach many accommodations among competing interests based on distinctive ecological, political, cultural, economic, and administrative factors that vary from place to place and time to time.  Hard choices about when to prevent and when to accept ecological degradation cannot be made in the abstract; they must be based instead on the particular ecological and social characteristics of a myriad distinctive disputes. Inevitably, many people possessing differing values and circumstances will disagree with any environmental choice or compromise that  is reached.

Despite the inability to pinpoint the precise extent of how much ecovitality conservation is desirable, virtually all self- identified environmentalists and many other people would agree that too much ecological degradation is occurring in too many places, and hence that better conservation measures are urgently required. This relative judgment, that there has been too much environmental destruction and not enough ecovitality conservation around the world, provides the central rationale for my founding the EcoVitality organization.