Ecological Economics
Ecological Economics
5 years ago

Discourses in Ecosystem Accounting: A Survey of the Expert Community

National ecosystem accounting is an emerging framework for measuring the links between ecosystems and human well-being for national planning. It directly addresses Sustainable Development Goal 15.9, in which countries have agreed to integrate ecosystem values into national planning. The community of practice for national ecosystem accounting includes not only the international and national researchers who develop such a framework, but also the national analysts who implement it and the decision makers who apply it. To foster convergence within this community on such a common measurement platform, it is first necessary to understand the issues of divergence of values and preferences among the diverse and international ethical perspectives, disciplines and roles involved. A cluster analysis of a survey of 131 expert stakeholders in national ecosystem accounting reveals agreement within this community on the need for broadening the scope, addressing multiple decision contexts and mainstreaming national ecosystem accounting in national planning. The most important sources of divergence in this community of practice are attributed to ethical positions regarding monetization of ecosystem services, differences in the interpretation of several core concepts, such as biodiversity and ecosystem services, and the role of spatial analysis.

Publisher URL: www.sciencedirect.com/science

DOI: S0921800916313167

You might also like
Discover & Discuss Important Research

Keeping up-to-date with research can feel impossible, with papers being published faster than you'll ever be able to read them. That's where Researcher comes in: we're simplifying discovery and making important discussions happen. With over 19,000 sources, including peer-reviewed journals, preprints, blogs, universities, podcasts and Live events across 10 research areas, you'll never miss what's important to you. It's like social media, but better. Oh, and we should mention - it's free.

  • Download from Google Play
  • Download from App Store
  • Download from AppInChina

Researcher displays publicly available abstracts and doesn’t host any full article content. If the content is open access, we will direct clicks from the abstracts to the publisher website and display the PDF copy on our platform. Clicks to view the full text will be directed to the publisher website, where only users with subscriptions or access through their institution are able to view the full article.