THE CONCEPT OF ECOSYSTEM SERVICES:

CONTRIBUTIONS, PITFALLS, AND ALTERNATIVES

Sharachchandra (Sharad) Lele

Senior Fellow & ConvenorCentre for Environment & Development,

ATREE, Bangalore (slele@atree.org)

A few words about ATREE & CED

• ‘Academic think-tank’– Generating knowledge relevant for conservation

and sustainable & equitable development– Ensuring rigour through academic interactions– Building capacities through a PhD programme

and other training activities• Based in Bangalore, with 6 other field stations

and 2 liaison offices in Delhi and Gangtok• 20 faculty members, 35 students, 50+

research staff, 30 support staff• 2 Centres with 2 programmes each

Essence of the arguments• The concept of ‘Ecosystem Services’ idea

(and its economic manifestations: Valuation and Payments) are a serious force in the current thinking on environmental conservation & sustainable development.

• This idea has strengths, but also has significant limitations and pitfalls, not just in implementation but also in concept.

• A better framework would be more self-reflective, more broad-based in values, more realistic in its characterisation of nature, and multi-causal.

Growth of the idea of ES

Versions, Convergence & Divergence • Strand 1: Ehrlich & Mooney 1983, and then Daily

• Scope:– Started with ‘life-support services’, i.e., those features of

the biotic environment that are seen as essential for the very survival of human beings on earth

– Broadened to include ALL ‘indirect services’ (similar to Westman 1977)

• Research question:– How would species extinction affect these services?

• Framework:– Indirect services are ‘in addition to’ the value/importance

of biodiversity for its own sake– Valuation is important because policy makers only listen

to $$.• Normative concern: biodiversity loss/conservation

– Show how natural (=diverse!) ecosystems “out there” benefit humans “out here”

– “I think it is going to be a long haul for biodiversity for its own sake. For me, ecosystem services is a strategy to buy time as well as getting buy-in.” Gretchen Daily (quoted in interview in Nature, 2009)

• Strand 2: Pearce, Costanza, De Groot: • Scope:

– ALL benefits derived from the environment (provisioning, regulatory, cultural),

• Notion of ‘environmental degradation’– All resource depletion, pollution, & extinction

• Research question: – How does environmental degradation affect

aggregate human well-being?• Framework:

– Economic CBA is the right way to make decisions – Environment = Natural Capital– NC degrades because its contribution is undervalued– So we need Total Economic Valuation

• Normative Concerns: – Economic efficiency, sustainability

Versions, Convergence & Divergence

MEA Framework

Main attraction• If TEV already existed as a concept, what is

the sudden attraction for this new terminology?– Shifts the tone of discussion from

‘development is bad for conservation’ to ‘conservation is good for development’

• Ecologists think PES will solve their problem– Also, settles the debate in favour of strong

sustainability (NC not fungible with HC)– “Biodiversity” as providing “life-supporting

services” is much stronger than ‘Natural capital’ (Ecosystem provides a ‘service’)

Main contribution– Has generated new biophysical information

on indirect use values/benefits of ‘natural’ ecosystems

• Pollination• Water purification• Pest control• Cyclone protection by mangroves• Nursery function of estuaries

– Is beginning to make ecologists think in an integrative manner over a landscape

– Has gotten ecologists to collaborate with economists

Limitations…1 • Lots of confusion between process,

function and benefit Double counting of supporting services as benefits

• Confusion about the role of biodiversity

Limitations 2• Dis-services left out! • Alternative scenario not specified: so

tradeoffs not clear• Tradeoffs between different services

from the same ecosystem are ignored– sequestration goes up => production

comes down• Results are pre-determined:

Biodiversity must be conserved. Leads to bad science & special pleading

Dis-servicesDis-service Study area Impact

((economic) losses due to dis-service/ number of people affected)

Time unit Reference

Crop damage due to wildlife

Four southern states of India

6.5 million Rs. 1981-1983 (Sukumar 1989)

Sariska Tiger Reserve, Rajasthan

3,300 Rs./household (average) Annually between 1996-1997

(Sekhar 1998)

Loss of livestock

Kibber Wildlife Sanctuary, Himachal Pradesh

18% of the total livestock of families around sanctuary; economic loss of 12% of income

1995 (Mishra 1997)

Loss of lives to elephant attacks

South India 30-50 Annually (Sukumar 1991)

West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, & Assam

115-160 Annually (Sukumar 1991)

India 300 Annually (Bist 2002)

Loss of lives to tiger attacks

Sundarbans, West Bengal

57 (average) Annually, between 1975-1984

(Khan 1987; Sanyal 1987)

Loss of lives to snake bites

Asia 100,000 Annually (Sharma et al. 2004)

India 15,000-50,000 Annually (Chippaux 1998; Kasturiratne et al. 2008; Meenatchisundaram and Michael 2009)

Our response 1

• Focus on ultimate benefits (not functions as benefits)

• Clearly allow for negative and positive relationship between ecosystem condition and well-being

• Clearly allow for tradeoffs between different ecosystem services

• Always specify alternative scenario

Limitations 2b

• Absence of human labour, capital and technology and also of other natural resources (abiotic)

Limitations …3 (of Valuation)

• Valuation essentially puts Rupee units on the plus signs in the matrix– Assumes markets or shadow markets

exist for everything: commodification• BCA aggregates across stakeholders

– Uses ‘one rupee one vote’ approach to decision-making: unfair, undemocratic

– Discounting implies aggregation over time, over generations

Issues hidden by the matrix: PE insights

• How rights are assigned• Whether use is sustainable, how

sustainability is ensured• How the plus signs are actually created:

– Ecological management practices that link processes & structure to relevant functions

– Technology, man-made capital and institutions that determine the capturing of ‘benefits’ from ‘functions’• E.g., Hydrological service• E.g., NTFP markets

Our response 2

Our normative framework• We approach the investigation in an open-

ended manner, and with multiple values: – Enhancing all benefits important, and not all

benefits come from retaining naturalness– Equity in distribution of benefits is important– Sustainability is different from biodiversity

conservation– Democratic process is also important

• Our understanding: – History of colonial forestry– CFM history in Odisha

Environmental Governance approach

• Societal goals include not just conservation: – Productivity/Well-being (material & non-

material)– Equity & Justice– Sustainability– Democracy of process

• Tradeoffs (winners & losers) are ubiquitous, and require “fairness” to be focused on

• Negotiation is essential– Commodification not possible– Commodification not desirable

• Initial assignment of rights and institutions of negotiation are both key

• Socio-economic position of winners & loser is also relevant (because of wider goals & because they influence the negotiation)