Burkhard Schweppe-Kraft: Natural Capital in Germany - State and Valuation; with special reference to Biodiversity

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Burkhard Schweppe-Kraft

Natural Capital in Germany - State and Valuation; with special reference to Biodiversity

24 pp.
5.27 EUR
(October 2009)

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In his paper Burkhard Schweppe-Kraft starts with an analysis of the current situation in nature conservation and preservation of ecosystem services in Germany. The state of ecosystem services is outlined along the main ecosystem components: climate, air, water, soil and biodiversity. The further discussion focuses on the biodiversity component. According to Schweppe-Kraft the political targets for biodiversity on German, EU and international level at first look seem to be linked to the concept of strong sustainability. A closer view, however, reveals that it is quite doubtful whether implementation would really be in line with the strong sustainability idea. In fact, political activities prove that there is a strong demand for additional, more neo-classical arguments for nature conservation, which rather belong to the concept of weak sustainability. For Schweppe-Kraft an evaluation of economic valuation studies in Germany shows that the most important component of the value of biodiversity is constituted by people?s willingness to pay for biodiversity conservation based on ethical or aesthetical reasons. The willingness to pay, as stated in interviews at ? so called ? contingent valuation studies, exceeds the required costs for biodiversity conservation greatly. This means that conserving biodiversity as a natural capital pays off very well in economic terms. Stated preferences are, however, a weak argument in the political debate, at least in Germany. But this seems for Schweppe-Kraft to be true also for other countries. Therefore, the commonly applied neo-classical stated preference methods for nature valuation should be complemented by additional approaches. The approach he presents is based on restoration costs and restoration time according to the ?Habitat Equivalency Analysis? (HEA) developed in the USA for compensating for ecosystem damages.

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