Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
they are still protected regardless of any cost-benei t analysis having been
undertaken.
Conclusions
Rapidly increasing human populations and associated economic develop-
ment around the world have imposed real pressures on natural habitat
and its biodiversity. This is a subject of major concern to policy-makers
and the public at large because it is recognized that biodiversity loss could
seriously diminish the options open to future generations. All too often
market and policy imperfections obscure the social costs of managed
lands, giving rise to inei cient land use and biodiversity loss.
Protected areas represent a high cost solution to biodiversity conserva-
tion in many areas. They impose considerable costs on producers, limit
future development options, reduce the supply of market produce and
they fail to engage land managers in conservation initiatives.
Joint production of commercial goods and biodiversity in managed
landscapes represents an important alternative to reserves. Indeed there is
evidence to suggest that biodiversity can coexist in landscapes of economic
importance and that it is important in supporting productive processes
in managed areas. However, highly intensive managed systems may pose
a threat to biodiversity in some areas and it is vital that managers and
policy-makers work together to develop strategies to avoid such losses.
Policy-makers should contribute to this process by developing instru-
ments that internalize biodiversity values into market behaviour. This
will help to avoid intervention failure and perverse incentives that lead
to biodiversity loss, ensuring that biodiversity values are protected and
provided ei ciently.
Uncertainty over the benei ts and costs of biodiversity and its role in the
functioning of ecosystems point towards the need for a diversii ed strategy
that includes protected areas as well as privately managed land used for
production. In the absence of a concerted ef ort by policy-makers and
land managers, the opportunity to develop initiatives that include private
lands in such a strategy to achieve biodiversity conservation goals will be
missed.
Note
1.
Biodiversity thus represents the diversity of all life as being a characteristic property of
nature, rather than a resource. The term also has a broader meaning for the set of organ-
isms themselves. For example, a biodiverse tropical rainforest, therefore, refers to the
quality or range of diversity within it.
