Does local Natural Capital Accounting deliver useful policy and management information? A case study of Dartmoor and Exmoor National Parks.

Natural capital accounting provides a systematic framework through which to quantify the benefits of natural assets. National-scale applications have demonstrated the feasibility of developing such accounts and their value as a tool to support environmental policy and management decisions. Building on that success, there have been increasing calls for sub-national organisations (for example, protected area authorities and water companies) to develop their own natural capital accounts. As we document in this paper, recent efforts by local organisations in the UK to produce such accounts have tended to rely on a set of 'standard practice' methods, many borrowed directly from national natural capital accounting exercises. In this paper, we review those methods and apply them in producing natural capital accounts for two UK National Parks. Working with the National Park Authorities, we critically assess the usefulness of those accounts to inform local land management. On account of data gaps and significant sensitivity to methodological assumptions, our research shows that these local accounts are considered of limited practical use for land management decision making at a local scale. Through specific illustrative examples, we show that natural capital accounts for local decision-making can be improved through: the inclusion of fit-for-purpose data and valuation methods, the consideration of uncertainties, and the incorporation of ecological information and spatial aspects. We also highlight the need for the development of both standardised guidelines and readily-available tools to quantify and value ecosystem services.

Combined carbon and health taxes outperform single-purpose information or fiscal measures in designing sustainable food policies.

The food system is a major source of both environmental and health challenges. Yet, the extent to which policy-induced changes in the patterns of food demand address these challenges remains poorly understood. Using a survey-based, randomized controlled experiment with 5,912 respondents from the United Kingdom, we evaluate the potential effect of carbon and/or health taxes, information and combined tax and information strategies on food purchase patterns and the resulting impact on greenhouse gas emissions and dietary health. Our results show that while information on the carbon and/or health characteristics of food is relevant, the imposition of taxes exerts the most substantial effects on food purchasing decisions. Furthermore, while carbon or health taxes are best at separately targeting emissions or dietary health challenges, respectively, a combined carbon and health tax policy maximizes benefits in terms of both environmental and health outcomes. We show that such a combined policy could contribute to around one third of the reductions in residual emissions required to achieve the United Kingdom's 2050 net-zero commitments, while discouraging the purchase of especially unhealthy snacks, sugary drinks and alcohol and increasing the purchase of fruit and vegetables.

Do we care about sustainability? An analysis of time sensitivity of social preferences under environmental time-persistent effects.

Environmental cost-benefit analysis has traditionally assumed that the value of benefits is sensitive to their timing and that outcomes are valued higher, the sooner in time they occur following implementation of a project or policy. Though, this assumption might have important implications especially for the social desirability of interventions aiming at counteracting time-persistent environmental problems, whose impacts occur in the long- and very long-term, respectively involving the present and future generations. This study analyzes the time sensitivity of social preferences for preservation policies of adaptation to climate change stresses. Results show that stated preferences are time insensitive, due to sustainability issues: individuals show insignificant differences in benefits they can experience within their own lifetimes compared to those which occur in the longer term, and which will instead be enjoyed by future generations. Whilst these results may be specific to the experimental design employed here, they do raise interesting questions regarding choices over time-persistent environmental problems, particularly in terms of the desirability of interventions which produce longer-term benefits.

Valuing the recreational benefits of wetland adaptation to climate change: a trade-off between species' abundance and diversity.

Climate change will further exacerbate wetland deterioration, especially in the Mediterranean region. On the one side, it will accelerate the decline in the populations and species of plants and animals, this resulting in an impoverishment of biological abundance. On the other one, it will also promote biotic homogenization, resulting in a loss of species' diversity. In this context, different climate change adaptation policies can be designed: those oriented to recovering species' abundance and those aimed at restoring species' diversity. Based on the awareness that knowledge about visitors' preferences is crucial to better inform policy makers and secure wetlands' public use and conservation, this paper assesses the recreational benefits of different adaptation options through a choice experiment study carried out in S'Albufera wetland (Mallorca). Results show that visitors display positive preferences for an increase in both species' abundance and diversity, although they assign a higher value to the latter, thus suggesting a higher social acceptability of policies pursuing wetlands' differentiation. This finding acquires special relevance not only for adaptation management in wetlands but also for tourism planning, as most visitors to S'Albufera are tourists. Thus, given the growing competition to attract visitors and the increasing demand for high environmental quality and unique experiences, promoting wetlands' differentiation could be a good strategy to gain competitive advantage over other wetland areas and tourism destinations.