Please invest in Our Daily Planet today, by making a one time or monthly contribution.
We do not charge our readers a subscription fee for our content. We want to continue to grow our readership, particularly among millennials and public servants. Voluntary contributions from readers will help us employ interns and freelance journalists, expand our content, and reach a larger audience.
If you make a contribution of $150 or more, you will become an official “Friend of the Planet” and receive a Friend of the Planet T-shirt or water bottle.
Our Daily Planet is a daily morning email (M-F) to keep you informed of the stories shaping our environment. If these issues matter to you, we’d like to be the best ten minutes of your morning.
A report in theDasgupta Review shows that by using a fiscal lens to view Earth’s growing biodiversity loss, we can see how it links to economic development. By viewing nature as an asset like “produced capital (roads, buildings and factories)” or “human capital (health, knowledge and skills)” — as the report defines them — it is apparent that biodiversity makes nature more economically valuable.
Why this Matters: More governments and institutions are beginning to recognize that the destruction of our world’s ecosystems would be financially disastrous. Climate change will not only cause loss of natural resources and valuable carbon sinks, but reviving the health of damaged ecosystems and biodiversity is incredibly costly with dire consequences to global health and food security.
During the panel, Sir Partha Dasgupta, the Frank Ramsey Professor Emeritus of Economics at Cambridge University, gave the example of a peat bog, which stores carbon and protects water quality. Should peatlands be destroyed by climate change or human development, the government would have to pay for water purification plants to replace that lost nature-based service.
Investing in Natural Assets
British Ambassador to the US Dame Karen Pierce and Senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii spoke about putting the economic value of nature into action. Senator Schatz emphasized that deforestation counts for at least 10% of greenhouse gas emissions, and nearly 40% of tropical deforestation results from illegal clearing. He created a bill that would prohibit imports produced from illegally deforested lands as a means of disincentivizing deforestation, which leads to biodiversity loss.
Ambassador Pierce highlighted initiatives taken by the UK to fight climate change’s economic effects, such as setting the first legally binding emissions reductions target in 2008 andbeing the first major economy to legislate for zero carbon emissions by 2050. In advance of COP26, she emphasized that it’s time to take steps to restore biodiversity loss, saying: “It is not just about ambition, it’s about translating that ambition into action.”
By WW0 Staff For the United States, the post-Trump, pre-COP26 road to Glasgow has been paved with ambition and humility. In a major speech, the President’s Envoy, John Kerry, previewed the results of his climate diplomacy before heading into two weeks of intense deliberations of world leaders. Speaking at the London School of Economics — […]
Next week, the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow will draw hundreds of world leaders to Glasgow to determine the path forward five years after the Paris Climate Agreement (for a primer, read this) as new science underscores the urgency. The conference aims to squeeze countries to strengthen the commitments they’ve made towards securing global net-zero […]
By Amy Lupica, ODP Daily Editor In a report released last week, the Department of Defense (DOD) confirmed that existing risks and security challenges in the US are being made worse due to “increasing temperatures; changing precipitation patterns; and more frequent, intense, and unpredictable extreme weather conditions caused by climate change. Now, the Pentagon is […]
Subscribe to the email that top lawmakers, renowned scientists, and thousands of concerned citizens turn to each morning for the latest environmental news and analysis.
Want the lastest climate news summarized for you each morning?
Our Daily Planet is your daily dose of the stories shaping our world and the ways that you can take action. From the climate crisis to the protection of biodiversity, if these issues matter to you then please subscribe & stay informed!
Your privacy is Important! We promise never to use your email address to send you spam or advertisements.