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the economic value of natural enemy survival when making profit-maximizing
decisions on insecticide applications.
Other attempts at placing economic values on pest regulation ecosystem services, such as Losey and Vaughan (2006) and Pimentel et al. (1997), estimated the
total cost of averted pest damage due to all pest control practices and then attributed
a fraction of the total pest control benefit to natural enemies. While these aggregate
values provide snapshots of the possible magnitude of the benefit from natural pest
control, they ignore the local context and are also subject to the critiques of not
being economically credible.
Some modeling tools such as those discussed in Chap. 15 also provide a quantitative means to valuing ecosystems and ecosystem services in the context of FEW
systems analysis. Typically, these models include ecosystem components (e.g.,
water, land, vegetation, biota) as well as economics and financial analysis capabilities, so they can be used to quantify impacts to ecosystems from FEW activities as
well as valuing the services provided to FEW systems.
9.3.3 Ecosystems and the Nexus Within the Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs)
In Sect. 3.7, we reviewed the 2015 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and
their and their associated targets, which agreed to by all 193 UN member countries
and represent a major step toward better integration of ecosystem services into the
sustainable development efforts of meeting water, food and energy targets. The
SDGs requires careful balancing between the environmental, social, and economic
dimensions of specific development challenges.
Unfortunately, it is oftentimes much too easy to address one component of the
food, energy, and water nexus in any specific situation and let the other two fall by
the wayside. For example, mitigating climate change through biofuel production in
any given country may compete with an agenda to end hunger and achieve food
security: both endeavors might be competing for the same land and water resources.
The logical priority for many countries may be to choose the social benefits of
food production over the environmental benefits of green energy, unless long-term
costs and benefits, both tangible and intangible, are accounted for. Although a
mechanism for measuring how successfully countries achieve the multiple goals
remains a challenge, the acknowledgment that all goals should the achieved simultaneously represents a major step forward relative to the siloed sectoral approach in
the previous global development agenda.
Achieving the SDG targets may require even more difficult decisions regarding
trade-offs at the Nexus compared to earlier development goal schemes. The scale of
the SDGs and the context in which they are being implemented are very different
from that of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The MDGs consisted of
just 8 goals and 18 targets, whereas the Sustainable Development Goals have 17
goals and 169 targets (see Sects. 3.5 and 3.7).
9 Ecosystems and Ecosystem Services
the economic value of natural enemy survival when making profit-maximizing
decisions on insecticide applications.
Other attempts at placing economic values on pest regulation ecosystem services, such as Losey and Vaughan (2006) and Pimentel et al. (1997), estimated the
total cost of averted pest damage due to all pest control practices and then attributed
a fraction of the total pest control benefit to natural enemies. While these aggregate
values provide snapshots of the possible magnitude of the benefit from natural pest
control, they ignore the local context and are also subject to the critiques of not
being economically credible.
Some modeling tools such as those discussed in Chap. 15 also provide a quantitative means to valuing ecosystems and ecosystem services in the context of FEW
systems analysis. Typically, these models include ecosystem components (e.g.,
water, land, vegetation, biota) as well as economics and financial analysis capabilities, so they can be used to quantify impacts to ecosystems from FEW activities as
well as valuing the services provided to FEW systems.
9.3.3 Ecosystems and the Nexus Within the Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs)
In Sect. 3.7, we reviewed the 2015 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and
their and their associated targets, which agreed to by all 193 UN member countries
and represent a major step toward better integration of ecosystem services into the
sustainable development efforts of meeting water, food and energy targets. The
SDGs requires careful balancing between the environmental, social, and economic
dimensions of specific development challenges.
Unfortunately, it is oftentimes much too easy to address one component of the
food, energy, and water nexus in any specific situation and let the other two fall by
the wayside. For example, mitigating climate change through biofuel production in
any given country may compete with an agenda to end hunger and achieve food
security: both endeavors might be competing for the same land and water resources.
The logical priority for many countries may be to choose the social benefits of
food production over the environmental benefits of green energy, unless long-term
costs and benefits, both tangible and intangible, are accounted for. Although a
mechanism for measuring how successfully countries achieve the multiple goals
remains a challenge, the acknowledgment that all goals should the achieved simultaneously represents a major step forward relative to the siloed sectoral approach in
the previous global development agenda.
Achieving the SDG targets may require even more difficult decisions regarding
trade-offs at the Nexus compared to earlier development goal schemes. The scale of
the SDGs and the context in which they are being implemented are very different
from that of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The MDGs consisted of
just 8 goals and 18 targets, whereas the Sustainable Development Goals have 17
goals and 169 targets (see Sects. 3.5 and 3.7).
9 Ecosystems and Ecosystem Services