Ecosystem services — Transcript

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1. 0:00we're talking about why biodiversity is
2. 0:02important specifically to us as humans
3. 0:05in the form of ecosystem
4. 0:07Services given that we'll lose about 20%
5. 0:10of the present species richness by the
6. 0:11middle of the century it's crucial to
7. 0:13ask why that should matter to any of us
8. 0:16should we be worried about that loss and
9. 0:18why do so many of us care so much about
10. 0:20it
11. 0:21already there are three main ways in
12. 0:24which biodiversity is crucial to humans
13. 0:26the first is by Direct Services the
14. 0:29second is by indirect services and the
15. 0:32third is the aesthetic or ethical effect
16. 0:35we get so many things directly from
17. 0:37biodiversity on this planet food
18. 0:40clothing housing Transportation many
19. 0:43medicines and medical supplies and even
20. 0:46energy in some cases these things are
21. 0:49derived directly from various
22. 0:51ecosystems food goes without saying all
23. 0:54of our major food types as diverse as
24. 0:55they might be originated in diverse
25. 0:58ecosystems turns out out that there are
26. 1:01wild types of tomatoes still growing in
27. 1:03Peru these Peruvian tomatoes are a
28. 1:05different species from the kind of
29. 1:06tomato that we typically eat and hold
30. 1:08some of the genetic diversity within
31. 1:10them when bred with some of the tomatoes
32. 1:12that we're using as our own food now the
33. 1:14yield from the hybrid Tomatoes can go up
34. 1:17almost as much as
35. 1:1850% and we wouldn't have that
36. 1:20productivity if we'd let that wild type
37. 1:22of Peruvian tomato go extinct if we
38. 1:25didn't have that as part of the
39. 1:26biodiversity out there today there's no
40. 1:28way that we would have access access to
41. 1:30that genetic
42. 1:31diversity another direct service
43. 1:33provided by biodiversity is shelter
44. 1:36originally we built housing out of all
45. 1:38kinds of biological materials and even
46. 1:40today we're still building houses out of
47. 1:43trees and what about medicine almost all
48. 1:46of the medicines that humankind has
49. 1:48developed have come directly from
50. 1:50studying the way that organisms live in
51. 1:52their environment how they interact and
52. 1:55the chemicals that they use during those
53. 1:58interactions the Rosie Periwinkle is a
54. 2:00very famous example of a plant that
55. 2:02grows in some very secluded environments
56. 2:05in Madagascar and it turns out that this
57. 2:07plant produces a couple of very
58. 2:10interesting chemicals that are now used
59. 2:12to treat childhood
60. 2:13leukemia and again we wouldn't have
61. 2:16those medicines if the rosie Periwinkle
62. 2:19had gone extinct some of the more
63. 2:21interesting things that I think people
64. 2:22forget about when thinking about the
65. 2:24value of biodiversity fall under the
66. 2:25category of indirect services that are
67. 2:28delivered to us by healthy
68. 2:32ecosystems if you think about mangrove
69. 2:34swamps which are these fantastic places
70. 2:36along the coastal margins of some
71. 2:38tropical countries where specific types
72. 2:40of trees trees called mangroves grow
73. 2:44mangroves can grow in saltwater so they
74. 2:46form a semi-arc at the edge between Land
75. 2:50and
76. 2:51Sea there are many species of mangrove
77. 2:53trees and they're all really tough
78. 2:55resilient plants that provide tremendous
79. 2:58services to us and to the natural
80. 3:00environment they protect the coastline
81. 3:02from wave action and erosion they're
82. 3:05nurseries for all kinds of different
83. 3:07types of organisms and some of these are
84. 3:09very important food types for us
85. 3:12unfortunately in certain parts of the
86. 3:14world people are destroying the
87. 3:16mangroves in order to make shrimp
88. 3:17Fisheries they remove the mangroves and
89. 3:20set up shrimp Farms with the idea that
90. 3:23they're adding economic value to that
91. 3:25part of the coastline by putting in a
92. 3:27shrimp farm that's going to produce a
93. 3:29commercial viable
94. 3:31product but if you look at a graph of
95. 3:33the value of these things the value of
96. 3:35the shrimp farm is really only one third
97. 3:38maybe even only one quar of the value of
98. 3:41the original undisturbed Mangrove swamp
99. 3:44because of the protection that the
100. 3:46mangroves give against storms and
101. 3:48erosion and the food sources they
102. 3:50produce such as fish you can actually
103. 3:53attach a dollar value to these things
104. 3:55which is sometimes the only way that
105. 3:57people really come to grips with
106. 3:59ecosystem
107. 4:00value it's the only way that people
108. 4:02really understand the value of ecosystem
109. 4:05services to humanity economic value of
110. 4:08intact biodiversity has also been
111. 4:10determined for ecosystems far from
112. 4:12mangrove swamps much closer to home some
113. 4:15years ago a large city on the East Coast
114. 4:18which shall remain nameless except that
115. 4:20it's New York had an issue with the
116. 4:22quality of its source water there are
117. 4:25rivers feeding into the New York City
118. 4:27area and the sources of that water were
119. 4:30being compromised by pollution and
120. 4:32environmental degradation to the point
121. 4:33where biodiversity was being lost in
122. 4:35some of those areas so City officials
123. 4:38had a question in front of them how do
124. 4:40we deal in a costeffective way with this
125. 4:43problem of declining quality of our
126. 4:45water it turns out that to build
127. 4:48treatment plants to deal with cleaning
128. 4:50the water up was going to cost somewhere
129. 4:52in the neighborhood of $6 billion just
130. 4:55to build the treatment plants and then
131. 4:57another 300 million per year to maintain
132. 5:01those plants and make sure that they
133. 5:02were doing the things that we were
134. 5:04supposed to by removing the harmful
135. 5:06chemicals that were being introduced
136. 5:07through environmental degradation
137. 5:09Upstream then they looked at what it was
138. 5:11going to cost to clean up and restore
139. 5:14the environments to make sure that the
140. 5:16ecosystems and the biodiversity in those
141. 5:18ecosystems were maintained to the point
142. 5:20where they were doing what they would
143. 5:21naturally do by removing chemicals from
144. 5:24the water basically filtering it through
145. 5:26Wetland habitat wetland are tremendous
146. 5:30tremendous places for the recycling of
147. 5:32dangerous chemicals and for the removal
148. 5:34of chemicals from water and for
149. 5:36clarifying and cleaning water the cost
150. 5:39for this restoration was going to be
151. 5:41about $1 billion spread over 10 years
152. 5:45much much lower cost so the answer was
153. 5:48pretty clear you're going to go and
154. 5:50spend that billion dollars over 10 years
155. 5:53not only do you enhance the quality of
156. 5:55the water in a very cost effective way
157. 5:57but you do something else too and that
158. 6:00addresses the third and final aspect of
159. 6:02biodiversity value the ethical and
160. 6:05aesthetic services or value provided by
161. 6:10biodiversity these Services May in fact
162. 6:12be in some ways the most important ones
163. 6:16sure we can attach dollar values to the
164. 6:19direct and indirect cost of a decline in
165. 6:21biodiversity and a decline in
166. 6:22environmental services and ecosystem
167. 6:25services but the ethical and aesthetic
168. 6:28value is something that's very very very
169. 6:30difficult to put a price on you might
170. 6:32say okay well it costs so much to go
171. 6:35visit a park or you might enjoy the view
172. 6:38so much that you'll put a quarter into
173. 6:39the telescope and soak in that
174. 6:41environment but that's not really what
175. 6:43we're talking
176. 6:44about the value here comes in what we
177. 6:47leave for the future a drop in
178. 6:50biodiversity removal of biodiversity the
179. 6:53extinction of species those are things
180. 6:55that we can't repair lost biodiversity
181. 6:59something we cannot bring back so our
182. 7:02children are going to inherit a depleted
183. 7:05world the ethical and aesthetic quality
184. 7:08of the environments that they're going
185. 7:09to experience in their future is going
186. 7:11to be
187. 7:12decreased how do you put a dollar value
188. 7:15on that we are the stewards of the
189. 7:18environment but we are also the major
190. 7:21influence on Environmental Quality and
191. 7:23certainly on ecosystem function these
192. 7:25days through our activities that result
193. 7:28in pollution and over fishing habitat
194. 7:31destruction loss of certain species from
195. 7:34the
196. 7:35environment no one wants a world that's
197. 7:37filled with nothing but wheat corn
198. 7:41dandelion some cows and
199. 7:44us that's a very simple ecosystem that's
200. 7:47fraught with future difficulty and
201. 7:51instability if you redu biodiversity to
202. 7:54the point where the loss of species in
203. 7:56the ecological food web causes an ecolog
204. 7:59iCal collapse of that system we won't be
205. 8:01just standing by watching that collapse
206. 8:04we're going to be part of it clearly
207. 8:07biodiverse ecosystems are great places
208. 8:10to live and to visit there's much to see
209. 8:14they make you feel happy restful
210. 8:16appreciative full of awe and reminded of
211. 8:20what a remarkable and unique Planet this
212. 8:22is after all it's ours I think there's a
213. 8:26deeper sort of societal psychology at
214. 8:29work
215. 8:30here and it behooves us to pay attention
216. 8:33not just to the economically measured
217. 8:36direct and indirect services and
218. 8:38benefits provided by diversity Rich
219. 8:41healthy ecosystems but also to the
220. 8:44ethical and aesthetic value of those
221. 8:47amazing environments that are the
222. 8:49inheritance we will leave for future
223. 8:51Generations