System of EnvironmentalEconomic Accounting
Measurement framework towards sustainability
Alessandra Alfieri
Chief, Environmental-Economic Accounts Section
United Nations Statistics Division
Outline
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
History
The need for the SEEA
The nature of the SEEA
The development of the SEEA
Next steps
2
History
Policy
•
•
•
•
•
Brundtland (WCED) – 1983
Agenda 21 – 1992
SIDS – 1994 & 2005
MDGs – 2000
Johannesburg – 2002
• Marrakech process
• Rio +20 - 2012
Statistics
• Indicator sets (DPSIR,
FDES) - 70s onwards
• SEEA-1993 – Interim report
• SEEA-2003 – Best practices
• SEEA-Water - 2007
Statistical standard (interim)
• SEEA 2012 Statistical
standard
• SEEA-Energy 2012
3
Why we need SEEA?
• The economy impacts on the environment and the
environment impacts on the economy
• The state of the environment and its health are
important insofar as they provide services to
humanity
• To understand these linkages we need to integrate
environmental and economic information
• An accounting framework brings discipline to the
organisation of environmental and related data
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The information pyramid
Indicators
Accounts
SEEA
Basic data
Econ. Stats|Env. Stats
5
Environmental-Economic Accounting
and Environment Statistics
Environment statistics:
Often developed to answer
one particular question or
problem
Difficult to figure out if all
information is included
Not always easy to see the
whole picture, or how it
relates to other things
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Environmental-Economic Accounting and
Environment Statistics
Environmental accounts:
• Help to make sense of the
larger picture
• Help to identify pieces
that are missing
• Can make connections to
other statistics especially economic
statistics
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SEEA - the national accounts
for the environment
• Uses accounting concepts and classifications to
environmental information
• Links to the national accounts for the economy
• Broad definition of environmental assets
• Links monetary and physical information
• Separately identifies information already part of
the national accounts for the economy
• Enables national accounts to be adjusted for
depletion of natural resources and allocated the
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The SEEA Framework – Central framework
Territory of reference
Economy
Actors
-Enterprises
-Households
-Government
-Non-profit institutions
Instruments
-Financial/Monetary
-Taxes/subsidies
-Financing
-Resource rent
-Permits
Activities
-Production
-Consumption
-Accumulation
Analytical and Policy
Frameworks
Outside
territory of
reference
Land/
Resource use/
Ecosystems
-Productivity analysis
-Natural resource management
-Climate change
-Green Growth/Green Economy
Emissions/wa
ste
Outside
territory of
reference
Environment
Natural Resources (stocks)
-Land
-Water
-Ecosystems
-Soil
-Etc.
Natural Resource flows
-Materials
-Energy
-Water
-Ecosystem services
-Etc.
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9
SEEA accounts and aggregates –
Central framework
• Asset accounts: record stocks and changes in stocks (flows) of
natural resources such as land, forest, water and minerals
• Physical and hybrid flow accounts: provide a systematic
physical description of production and consumption processes,
including their natural resource inputs, product throughputs and
outputs i.e. wastes. Link the physical information to the economic
accounts
• Monetary accounts: separately identify environmentally- related
transactions presented in the existing SNA flow accounts in order
to make them more explicit for analysis
• Environmentally-adjusted aggregates: combine modules of
SEEA to form a full-sequence of accounts from which aggregates
such as Green GDP, or Net Saving can be derived.
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SEEA and the policy quadrants
Improving access to
services and resources
I
III
Improving the
state of the
environment and
reducing impacts
Managing supply and
demand
II
Sustainability
IV
Mitigating and
adapting to
extreme events
Quadrant I – Improving access to services
and resources
• SEEA informs policies that aim to ensure
households access resources and services
• Relevant indicators that can be used to
inform those policies are:
• Investments in infrastructure for delivery
• Losses in distribution
• Costs of services
Quadrant II – Managing supply and demand
• Refers to allocation of natural resources
• The following indicators can be derived directly
from the SEEA:
• Efficiency of production
• Decoupling
• Multi factor productivity
• Efficiency of consumption
• Embedded emissions
• Footprint indicators
• Costs of production and costs paid by users (fees, taxes, rents,
permits)
• Financing (who pays for the investments and current costs)
• Depletion estimates
Quadrant III-Improving the state of the
environment and reducing impacts
• Covers policies related to the health and capacity of
ecosystem to provide services and reducing the
impacts on the environment.
• Possible indicators that can be derived from the SEEA
are:
• Environmental protection and resource management
expenditures
• EGSS
• Emissions of pollutants into air and water and waste
• Land use and land cover
• Economic instruments
Quadrant IV – Mitigating and adapting to
extreme events
• Refers to policies that aim to reduce the potential
harm created by extreme events and changing
environmental patterns
• Possible indicators that can be derived from SEEA:
• Expenditure for mitigation and adaptation
• Measure to assess the impacts of disasters
The development of SEEA
• Three parts
• Part 1 – Central framework (to be adopted as
international statistical standard)
• Part 2 – Experimental Ecosystem accounting
• Part 3 – Extensions and applications
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SEEA Vol. 1 – Chapter structure
• Ch. 1 - Introduction and policy relevance
• Ch. 2 - Statistical framework
•
•
•
•
Stocks and flows in physical and monetary term
Statistical units
Boundaries (environment/economy, production and asset boundaries)
Classifications
• Ch. 3 - Physical flow accounts
-
Flows environment/economy and within economy,
MFA, Energy and water
• Ch. 4 – Monetary flow accounts
-
EGSS
Environmental Protection Expenditure and Resource Management Accounts
Taxes/subsidies, permits, rents, depletion
• Ch. 5 – Asset Accounts
-
Physical and monetary stocks and changes in stocks for land and natural resources (e.g.
mineral and energy resources, water, biological resources, etc.)
• Ch. 6 – Summarizing and integrating the accounts
-
Hybrid accounts
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SEEA Part 2 – Experimental
ecosystem accounts
• Conceptual framework – perspective of the
environment
• Statistical units for ecosystems and their link with
economic units
• Classification of ecosystem service
• Full carbon accounting
• Ecosystem health
• Monetary accounts
• Link to the SNA valuation principles
• Valuation of selected services
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SEEA Part 3 - Applications
• Audience
• Analysts and producers
• Technique based presentation
• Input-output and CGE modelling
• Resource efficiency and productivity indicators and the use of
hybrid tables
• Composite indicators
• Depletion adjusted saving techniques
• Consumption based I-O analysis / footprint techniques
• Decomposition analysis
• Complemented by glossy publications
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The development of SEEA
• Central framework (Chapters 1-6) are out for global
consultation (until 7 December 2011)
• Adoption by UN Statistical Commission expected in
March 2012
• Part 2 and Part 3 – planned for UN endorsement in
2013 (best practices)
• Work overseen by UNCEEA
• London Group on Environmental Accounting
considering technical issues
• World Bank, EEA and UNSD are leading the
development of experimental ecosystem accounts
• Extensive consultation with national statistical offices
and other key stakeholders
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The SEEA and supporting suite
of publications
Energy balances
Other water statistics
SEEA
Systems frameworks
SEEA-Water
SEEA-Energy
Output
frameworks
Input
frameworks
Cross
functional
frameworks
Intermediate frameworks
e.g. IRWS
e.g. IRES
Compilation Material
Compilation Material
ISIC, CPC, Asset Classification, Class. of
Environmental Activities, Class. of Physical Flows etc
Data
Data Quality Assessment Frameworks
Metadata and documentation (e.g. SDMX)
Implementation of SEEA
• Strategy of implementation being discussed by the
UNCEEA
• Agreement on a minimum set of accounts and tables
linked to the policy relevance
• Water and energy simplified accounts are good
candidates
• Training material to be developed on water and energy
– London Group on Environmental Accounting to
play a key role
• Could simplified tables for EGSS be considered?
Way forward
• Developing SEEA as an international standard will be
a critical milestone in mainstreaming environmentaleconomic accounting
• Reaffirming the SEEA as the measurement and
monitoring framework for sustainable
development/green economy
• Integration of policy/analytical and measurement
framework
• SEEA to be recognized in Rio
• Move forward in implementation
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