How do we value access to clean water? What about the soil that nourishes the plants and animals we eat? What is the value of wetlands that soak up flood waters?

These are difficult questions, and until recently, ones that have not been the focus of conservation efforts. In the past, conservation has been driven more by ethical and aesthetic considerations. Yet many people see nature from a more utilitarian perspective: what direct benefits can it provide? How can they modify natural systems—with dams or bridges, for instance—to suit their own ends?

As the world’s population grows and demands on the environment increase, the ecosystem services we depend on will continue to degrade, threatening the well-being of people and the habits that support the plants and animals we seek to protect.

Ecosystem services are the benefits people obtain from nature. This natural capital includes such things as food and water; regulation of floods, drought, land degradation and disease; soil formation and nutrient cycling; and cultural, spiritual, recreational and other nonmaterial benefits.

People in all parts of the world, rich and poor, depend on these goods and services, but because they are not treated as commodities they are usually taken for granted. Yet scientists estimate that the economic value of the services that intact ecosystems provide to the world economy is at least $30 trillion dollars annually.

According to the recent Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, the natural ecosystems vital to our survival are in trouble:

• Sixty percent of the primary ecosystem services are currently degraded or at risk of collapse.
• During the next 50 years, demand for food crops is projected to grow by 70 to 85 percent and for water by 30 to 85 percent, resulting in increased conversion of lands and waters and further degradation of ecosystem services and losses of biodiversity.
• Some 300 million people, most of them impoverished, depend on forest ecosystems for their subsistence and survival.
• The degradation of ecosystem services disproportionately affects the poorest of the poor.

What the Nature Conservancy is Doing.

Increasingly, The Nature Conservancy is devising strategies and implementing on-the-ground solutions that “Value Nature“ to help ensure a full and comprehensive accounting of the multiple values of natural ecosystems and the biodiversity they support. The goal is to broaden the conservation agenda, making it relevant to more individuals and institutions.

The Conservancy, with its scientific expertise and history of working closely with local communities, is well-positioned to establish global leadership in advancing a conservation agenda that incorporates ecosystem services. The Conservancy is:

• Conducting work that incorporates ecosystem services in more than 30 projects
• Collaborating with Stanford University and the World Wildlife Fund in the Natural Capital Project, which is drawing on a broad range of expertise to develop and test methods and tools for evaluating and mapping ecosystem services in different parts of the world
• Conducting projects that incorporate markets and payments for ecosystem services in several watershed and forested systems

Action starts when people talk.

In the midst of dire scenarios about declining natural systems, there are reasons for hope and things we can do as individuals. First, start a conversation about the issue with friends, family and colleagues. Take a look at our Conversation Starters related to economic impact for relevant and compelling facts. And, learn more about our ecosystem services work by visiting the Conservancy’s web site, nature.org.