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12 Jun 2008
Unit:
Alterra
In a baseline scenario for population growth and economic development, international biodiversity policy targets will not be met and lead to considerable physical, social and economic losses. This is the core message of the report "The Cost of Policy Inaction: the case of not meeting the 2010 biodiversity target', which is presented today, May 29th, by Alterra, Wageningen UR on the 9th Conference of Parties of the Convention of Biological Diversity in Bonn.
 The study presents the losses of biodiversity in past, present and future. The losses have been quantified and expressed in monetary terms by an international project team, which conducted the study for the European Commission's Directorate General Environment. The team was led by dr. Leon Braat of Alterra, Wageningen, UR. The results of the study indicate that the biodiversity policy targets of the CBD and the EU (a significant reduction of the loss and halting the loss of biodiversity, respectively by 2010) will not be met, without additional policies, not even in 2050.
The Baseline scenario (the consequences of no new-policies social and economic development)
- Population increases from ca 6 billion in 2000 to ca 9.1 billion in 2050, according to a medium-level projection of the United Nations.
- Economic growth (a.o. a refection of consumption) at 2.8 % per year, an OECD conservative growth scenario.
- Extra land for agriculture, implying additional conversion of natural systems to agricultural land use (14% more by 2030)
- Doubling of total energy use between 2000 and 2050, with climate change consequences
- Increase of food production for 50% more people
- Over-exploitation and crashed fisheries in all oceans; no more ocean fish for human consumption or to feed aquaculture
- Disappearance of 1300 million hectares (1.5 x the land area of the United States of America) of pristine natural systems to allow intensive agriculture, biofuels and asphalt.
Physical consequences
- Loss of ecosystems services, the products which ecosystems deliver and the work ecosystems do
- Short term maximisation of food production at the cost of natural ecosystems and biodiversity
- These changes have led to loss of regulating, buffer capacity of the world's ecosystems, for example climate regulation, flood control, water purification and soil quality maintenance.
- Food and water shortages with associated social deprivation for billions of people
Economic consequences
- By 2050, the annual loss of biodiversity on land will have increased to a sum total of loss of ecosystem services equivalent to 14,000 billion Euro. This is equivalent to ca 7 % of projected 2050 GDP.
- In addition, there are losses of ecosystems services of marine and coastal ecosystems which have not yet fully been analysed and summed, but which are expected to run up to several thousands of billion per year by 2050. Ocean fisheries is not expected to contributed anything anymore to the world economy by then, except for jellyfish.
- The social consequences will be dramatic. In particular, in developing countries with great dependency on ecosystems services for daily livelihood and shere survival. But the industrialized OECD countries will not escape the consequences. The expected shortages of fossil fuels by 2050 will lead to a confrontation with the basic dependency of humans on ecosystem services.
Background
"The Cost of Policy Inaction: The case of not meeting the 2010 biodiversity target" is a study for the European Commission, DG Environment. The Environment Ministers of the G8 countries as well as of Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa, the European Commissioner responsible for the Environment and senior officials from the United Nations and the IUCN (The World Conservation Union) met in Potsdam in March 2007 and created the so-called "Potsdam Initiative- Biological Diversity 2010" to set in motion specific activities for protection and sustainable use of biodiversity. The results of the COPI were presented to the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD) COP-meeting to be held in May 2008".
The report is available at: http://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/biodiversity/economics/index_en.htm
The study was conducted by a consortium led by Alterra, Wageningen UR in cooperation with the Institute for European Environmental Policy. The following organisations have contributed to the study: Alterra-Wageningen UR, IEEP (Institute for European Environmental Policy), Ecologic, FEEM (Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei), GHK, Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency/ MNP; UNEP-WCMC (United Nations Environmental Program - World Conservation Monitoring Center), and Witteveen + Bos.
Correspondence address: Dr. L.C. Braat, P.O. Box 47, 6700AA, Wageningen, the Netherlands. Leon.Braat@wur.nl; 00 31 0317 486473 / 486560
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