https://researchportal.port.ac.uk/portal/files/2269446/FAILLER_2015_pub_COES_The_IPBES_Conceptual_Framework_connecting_nature_and_people.pdf

The IPBES Conceptual Framework - connecting nature and people

It has been 20 years since two seminal publications about ecosystem services came out: an edited book by Gretchen Daily and an article in Nature by a group of ecologists and economists on the value of the world’s ecosystem services. Both of these have been very highly cited and kicked off an explosion of research, policy, and applications of the idea, including the establishment of this journal. This article traces the history leading up to these publications and the subsequent debates, research, institutions, policies, on-the-ground actions, and controversies they triggered. It also explores what we have learned during this period about the key issues: from definitions to classification to valuation, from integrated modelling to public participation and communication, and the evolution of institutions and governance innovation. Finally, it provides recommendations for the future. In particular, it points to the weakness of the mainstream economic approaches to valuation, growth, and development. It concludes that the substantial contributions of ecosystem services to the sustainable wellbeing of humans and the rest of nature should be at the core of the fundamental change needed in economic theory and practice if we are to achieve a societal transformation to a sustainable and desirable future.

Twenty years of ecosystem services: How far have we come and how far do we still need to go?

A major challenge today and into the future is to maintain or enhance beneficial contributions of nature to a good quality of life for all people. This is among the key motivations of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), a joint global effort by governments, academia, and civil society to assess and promote knowledge of Earth's biodiversity and ecosystems and their contribution to human societies in order to inform policy formulation. One of the more recent key elements of the IPBES conceptual framework ( 1 ) is the notion of nature's contributions to people (NCP), which builds on the ecosystem service concept popularized by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA) ( 2 ). But as we detail below, NCP as defined and put into practice in IPBES differs from earlier work in several important ways. First, the NCP approach recognizes the central and pervasive role that culture plays in defining all links between people and nature. Second, use of NCP elevates, emphasizes, and operationalizes the role of indigenous and local knowledge in understanding nature's contribution to people.

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Assessing nature's contributions to people

Anthropogenic global warming has significantly influenced physical and biological processes at global and regional scales. The observed and anticipated changes in global climate present significant opportunities and challenges for societies and economies. We compare the vulnerability of 132 national economies to potential climate change impacts on their capture fisheries using an indicator-based approach. Countries in Central and Western Africa (e.g. Malawi, Guinea, Senegal, and Uganda), Peru and Colombia in north-western South America, and four tropical Asian countries (Bangladesh, Cambodia, Pakistan, and Yemen) were identified as most vulnerable. This vulnerability was due to the combined effect of predicted warming, the relative importance of fisheries to national economies and diets, and limited societal capacity to adapt to potential impacts and opportunities. Many vulnerable countries were also among the world’s least developed countries whose inhabitants are among the world’s poorest and twice as reliant on fish, which provides 27% of dietary protein compared to 13% in less vulnerable countries. These countries also produce 20% of the world’s fish exports and are in greatest need of adaptation planning to maintain or enhance the contribution that fisheries can make to poverty reduction. Although the precise impacts and direction of climate-driven change for particular fish stocks and fisheries are uncertain, our analysis suggests they are likely to lead to either increased economic hardship or missed opportunities for development in countries that depend upon fisheries but lack the capacity to adapt.

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Vulnerability of national economies to the impacts of climate change on fisheries

Valuing nature's contributions to people: the IPBES approach

Fil: Silvetti, Felicitas. Universidad Nacional de Cordoba. Facultad de Ciencias Agropecuarias; Argentina

¿Por qué la Legislación no Protege a los Bosques Nativos de Argentina? Conflictos Socioambientales y Políticas Públicas en la Provincia de Córdoba.

Human wellbeing depends on nature, but in spite of much work by and since the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, it is not clear whether existing frameworks adequately analyze this relationship given our increasing market based societies. We report on a reassessment of this situation, developed at the recent workshop "Quantification of Ecosystem Services: concepts and measurement", co-organized by the World Agroforestry Centre, the Centre for International Forestry Research, Bioversity International and Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Centre. We assessed the need for a new framework, and sought consensus on the meaning of the term "ecosystem services" (ES), on approaches to their measurement and valuation along the full gradient of human modification of landscapes and on how to capture this vital knowledge in green accounting in a way that speaks to policy makers. A new framework is presented that combines both the ES and the livelihood capitals approaches. The ES concept emphasizes the benefits obtained by people from ecosystems and their economic value. In contrast, the multiple-capital livelihood framework has reframed debates on poverty by focusing on assets and resource access, not just on income. However, to maintain ES we need investment in natural capital. New standards for green accounting require clarity on "stocks", "stock change" and "flows". The agro-ecosystems managed to maximize "provisioning services" are both recipients and providers of ES - understanding and managing these dual roles require a framework that can apply to all phases of "forest and rural transitions", as well as the processes of change, so that strategic interventions can be planned. The proposed framework includes direct and indirect ES where benefits are derived from presence of natural capital respectively without and with the involvement of market economy. Thus human, social, cultural and political capitals (human wellbeing) are directly affected by natural capital, and indirectly affected through built and financial capitals (market economy). The benefits derived from ecosystem services must somehow lead to incentives to maintain and restore the natural capital that provides such services. By integrating the livelihood capitals approach, including a revised definition of natural capital, this new framework is applicable across the forest transition curve, and appropriate for assessing changes in importance and interactions of different capitals as societies pass from subsistence to market-based economies. It will also provide insight regarding interactions between people, nature and economy under different scenarios, including payment for ecosystem services schemes, green accounting and others. (Texte integral)

Linking biodiversity, ecosystem services and human wellbeing: towards a new framework

Este trabajo describe las representaciones que los pequenos productores (PPs) de Argentina central tienen acerca de la tecnologia agropecuaria y analiza su posible incidencia en los procesos de cambio tecnologico en proyectos de desarrollo rural. Utilizando una metodologia cualitativa, el trabajo senala que los PPs desarrollan sus actividades en un mundo donde coexisten practicas tecnologicas provenientes de campos distintos. Por un lado, la tecnologia tradicional generada, adaptada y transmitida de generacion en generacion y fundamentada en un modo de vida "tipicamente campesino". Por otro lado, la lenta pero persistente penetracion de las sociedades tradicionales por los valores y estilos de vida de las sociedades modernas. En consecuencia, el discurso de los PPs esta siendo influenciado por la idea de modernidad y cada vez con mayor frecuencia, los conceptos de confort, eficiencia y modernidad aparecen ligados a la idea de tecnologia. Sin embargo, los PPs muestran sentimientos contradictorios hacia la tecnologia moderna, lo que ha dado lugar a una serie de tecnologias hibridas conceptualizadas aqui como tecnologias de interfase

Las representaciones tecnológicas del pequeños productores agropecuarios de Argentina Central

Basado en un estudio de caso en Argentina central, esta investigacion formula conceptualizaciones tendientes a comprender las estrategias de apropiacion del agua rural; asimismo, analiza como las recientes transformaciones socioproductivas influyen en su apropiacion y, finalmente, discute sus probables consecuencias sociales. Los resultados sugieren que el avance de la expansion del capitalismo agrario debilita la autonomia de los campesinos y pobladores pobres para acceder al agua con fines de consumo humano o productivo. Esto consolida la posicion subordinada de los pobres rurales y la inequidad estructural de estos territorios, aumentando su vulnerabilidad ante practicas clientelares. Por su parte, los productores capitalizados son mas exitosos al apropiarse del agua rural.

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Acceso y apropiación del agua en comunidades rurales pobres de Argentina central: Transformaciones y conflictos

El trabajo analiza como se vinculan las agriculturas organica e industrial con la diversificacion productiva y la seguridad alimentaria. A partir de un estudio de caso, se aborda el problema en relacion a dos grupos de campesinos del NE de Argentina (uno de ellos vinculado con la produccion organica de hortalizas y el otro con el cultivo de tabaco). Se concluye que si bien ambos grupos han disenado sistemas bastante diversos desde el punto de vista productivo, son los productores vinculados a la agricultura organica quienes observan mayor diversificacion productiva y seguridad alimentaria. Asimismo se senala que la diversidad productiva observada no es solo un objetivo del diseno de estos sistemas a fin de disminuir el riesgo productivo y garantizar la seguridad alimentaria, es tambien una consecuencia de las condiciones en las que tiene lugar el proceso productivo, en especial la heterogeneidad ambiental, la baja productividad de las tecnologias utilizadas y el caracter eminentemente artesanal de la produccion campesina.

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Daniel Cáceres

Papers

¿Por qué la Legislación no Protege a los Bosques Nativos de Argentina? Conflictos Socioambientales y Políticas Públicas en la Provincia de Córdoba.

Linking biodiversity, ecosystem services and human wellbeing: towards a new framework

Las representaciones tecnológicas del pequeños productores agropecuarios de Argentina Central

Acceso y apropiación del agua en comunidades rurales pobres de Argentina central: Transformaciones y conflictos

Agricultura Orgánica versus Agricultura Industrial: Su Relación con la Diversificación Productiva y la Seguridad Alimentaria