Salzau 2010
Abstracts
2010
February
Bringing the ecosystem services concept into international policy:
Experiences and reflections on The Economics of Ecosystems and
Biodiversity (TEEB)
Carsten Neßhöver, Heidi Wittmer, Augustin Berghöfer, Christoph SchröterSchlaack, Irene Ring and Bernd Hansjürgens
Helmholtz-Centre for Environmental Research – UFZ, Leipzig, Germany
The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) is an international initiative
started in 2007 by the G8 to integrate ecological and economic knowledge to structure
the evaluation of ecosystem services. It aims to examine the economic costs of
biodiversity decline and the costs and benefits of actions to reduce these losses. Based
on the available science as well as relevant practical knowledge, it furthermore tries to
address its results towards different relevant stakeholder groups with focused reports,
thus recommending appropriate valuation methodologies for different contexts as well
as possible policy instruments, measures and actions in these contexts. In practical
terms, TEEB seeks to show that economics can be a powerful instrument in
biodiversity policy, both by supporting decision processes and by forging discourses
between science, economics and governing structures.
The TEEB reports released until now (TEEB Interim Report in 2008, TEEB for
National and International Policy Makers in 2009, see www.teebweb.org) faced a
high interest in policy on all levels, the civil society, business and the media, showing
that taking better into account the values of biodiversity and ecosystem services in
times of decreasing natural capital is of major importance.
The talk summarizes the major lines and results of the work of TEEB, its overall
approach and its impacts as well as the challenges in the area for the future. This will
be based on the context of the ongoing discussions about the international discussion
of improving the science-policy interfaces on biodiversity and ecosystem services in
Europe and worldwide.