Giant Study Probes Humanity's Impact on Ecosystems

Giant Study Probes Humanity's Impact on Ecosystems
Katherine Stapp - IPS 9/24/03

NEW YORK, Sep 23 (IPS) - With the global economy set to quadruple and another three billion people likely to be living on the planet by 2050, managing our dwindling natural resources in a sustainable way has literally become a matter of life or death.

To head off a potential crisis, scientists from more than 100 countries are participating in an ambitious review of the complex interaction between humans and their environment.

Called the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA), it will produce a series of reports that not only describe the current health of the world's resources, but offer insights into how decisions taken by leaders, from village heads on up to international bodies, influence ecosystem productivity.

The first report of the four-year project, to be released Wednesday, will details the Assessment's goals and methods.

"We shall attempt to provide guidance to policy makers on what kind of policy succeeds, where and why,'' explained Kanchan Chopra, co-chair of the MA Responses Working Group and head of the Institute of Economic Growth in New Delhi, India.

The MA will analyse existing data on the exploitation of marine, coastal, inland water, forest, desert, mountain, polar, farmland and urban regions. While its main concern is the ''products'' these ecosystems provide for human well-being -- food, fuel, fresh water -- it also acknowledges their intrinsic cultural and aesthetic value.

"One of the major problems facing decision-makers today is the lack of information about the environmental consequences of their day-to-day actions,'' said Jonathan Lash, president of the World Resources Institute (WRI).

''Thus, avoidable mistakes affect the lives of millions of people. The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment will help span this knowledge gap and make us better aware of the environmental consequences of our decisions," he said in an interview.

''Today we have the ability to change the vital systems of our planet, for better or for worse. To change them for the better, we must have better information about how the well-being of people and ecosystems are interwoven and how the fabric is fraying," Lash added.

Ecosystem services are especially critical in the lives of the world's poor. For example, fish is the main source of protein for nearly on billion people in developing countries. In Cambodia, the Tonle Sap freshwater lake provides protein for 60 percent of the country's population.

These resources have significant economic value, as well. The world's fisheries generated 55 billion dollars in export revenues in 2000, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).

But they are now becoming exhausted from overuse -- a fate shared by many other ecosystems. About 40 percent of the world's farmland is seriously degraded from erosion, pollution, salinisation and other causes.

At the same time, the consumption of ecosystem ''services'' is growing rapidly -- mostly by rich countries. By 2020, world demand for rice, wheat and maize is expected to nearly double. It is the formidable job of MA researchers to figure out how all these needs can be met.

''The assessment not only will tell what the status of our ecosystems is today, and in the recent past, but will also give plausible scenarios for the future based on different development patterns,'' said Harold Mooney, an ecologist at Stanford University and co-author of the first MA report.

Formally launched by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 2001, the MA was spurred by a need for sound data on how to push forward national and international development programmes, such as the U.N. Millennium Development Goals to eradicate extreme poverty, reduce child mortality and promote gender equality.

The reports will also meet the assessment needs of global treaties dealing with biodiversity, wetlands, desertification and migratory species.

''It will be 'the last word' on the science -- by following a process modelled on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and by putting the material through two rounds of peer review involving hundreds of reviewers, these findings will be the most authoritative and credible source of information on these issues,'' said MA Director Walter Reid.

The IPCC was a groundbreaking collaboration of scientists around the world to assess the links between human activity and climate change. It laid the scientific groundwork for the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on curbing greenhouse gases.

The four main reports -- on specific sub-regions, conditions and trends, future scenarios, and policy responses -- are due in 2005, and periodic updates will follow. Funding is coming primarily from U.N. agencies and the World Bank.

''While we do not advocate any particular policy perspective, we do believe that our findings will be useful to decision makers who must address problems of food and water supply, and human health and well-being,'' Steve Carpenter, co-chair of the MA Scenarios Working Group, told IPS.

''Thus, in addition to our technical documents -- such as the one that was just released -- we will be producing a variety of 'plain language' summaries for use by governments, businesses, private organisations and individual citizens.''

Accessibility will be key if governments and other key players are to take the MA conclusions seriously, researchers say.

''Information on the extent of degradation of some ecosystems should serve as a wakeup call for policy makers and galvanise them to initiate corrective actions,'' according to Prabhu Pingali, an economist with the FAO and co-author of the report.

''The message that will come out of the Millennium Assessment is a compelling one, but whether it will lead to action or not depends a lot on our ability to get that message out loudly and clearly.''

Millennium Assessment:
http://www.millenniumassessment.org/index.aspx

World Resources Institute:
http://newsroom.wri.org/advisory_text.cfm?MediaAdvisoryID=72