Modeling Ecosystem Services
20x20 | Driving investments in nature and human well-being
Helping decisionmakers better understand what to prioritize and where to invest in conservation has long been a central goal for Woods-affiliated scholars working with the Natural Capital Alliance (NatCap).
Multiple threads came together to create the cross-institutional partnership, including one of the Woods Institute’s first research awards and workshops drawing together leading conservation scholars and practitioners from Stanford, the Nature Conservancy, World Wildlife Fund and other organizations.
In 2008, the NatCap partnership, currently based out of the Stanford Woods Institute and Department of Biology, developed InVEST® (Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs), a modeling tool to map and value ecosystem services, or nature’s benefits to people. Since then, the suite of free, open-source software and tools has grown to include 20 ecosystem service models, covering terrestrial, freshwater, coastal and marine, and urban contexts. InVEST is now available in both Chinese and Spanish, and has been used in nearly all countries worldwide (>185), motivating greater investments in ecosystems – like forests, wetlands, mangroves, coral reefs, and fertile soils – and the wildlife inhabiting them. Applications of InVEST have appeared in nearly 1000 peer-reviewed publications worldwide.
NatCap’s impact in China has been particularly noteworthy. Working closely with the Chinese Academy of Sciences–a core NatCap partner–over the course of nearly two decades, the NatCap team has pioneered novel approaches for integrating natural capital information into decisions at scale. Using natural capital approaches and tools, including InVEST, China has re-zoned the entire country to better account for and steward nature’s benefits, limiting human impacts and targeting investments in more sustainable livelihoods on about half (49%) of its total land area. The target areas are vital to the provision of key ecosystem services, all national priorities: mitigating flooding, securing water supplies (for drinking, irrigation, and hydropower), renewing soil resources, reducing the risk of dust- and sandstorms, and conserving biodiversity (as an input to many vital benefits).
The designation of these zones in China provides an important scientific basis for “ecological transfer payments” from the central government. These payments are underway – tens of billions of USD over the past two decades – engaging local people in conservation and restoration, and building the economic structure for more sustainable livelihoods and long-term prosperity.
Another element of NatCap’s impact in China has been the co-development of a new economic metric, Gross Ecosystem Product (GEP). GEP was officially approved by the United Nations Statistical Commission in 2021 as part of its System of Environmental Economic Accounting, and is a useful complement to GDP, highlighting the contributions of nature to the economy that are overlooked by GDP.
China has conducted more than 196 GEP-based projects and released national GEP accounting standards. The country has developed a GEP-based administrative evaluation system, through which government officials are incentivized to maintain or increase nature’s contributions to the economy in their region; eco-compensation policies that pay citizens to protect nature; a GEP-based public procurement system; and GEP-based financing mechanisms.
GEP is now taking root globally, including in Colombia, Sri Lanka, Sweden, and numerous other countries.
Beyond China, NatCap is working closely with the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, and the Asian Development Bank to scale up the use of these and other natural capital approaches around the world through mainstreaming them in lending and operations. Examples of this include the BELA project which influenced $1 billion in development finance over two years, and the People, Planet, Prosperity project, with 16 pilot projects around the world.
Learn more about the Natural Capital Alliance and other Woods Centers, Programs and Initiatives.
Photo Credits: Top (iStock)
We're flashing back! See more stories about high impact research and solutions emerging from our work over the past two decades.
Read the 20x20 series