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Developing ecosystem accounts for the marine and coastal environment: Limitations, opportunities and lessons learned from the United Kingdom experience.
Full text linkThe marine and coastal environment provides crucial ecosystem services to sustain human activities and wellbeing. Advancing measurement frameworks to record the contribution of marine and coastal ecosystems to national wealth and economies and assess the sustainability of their use is therefore paramount. The recently proposed Ocean Accounting Framework outlined within the System of Environmental Economic Accounting represents a decisive step in this direction and provides a foundation for developing an integrated and standardised set of ecosystem accounts to support decision making and use of the seas. However, the ecological and socio-economic complexities of marine and coastal systems pose several challenges in compiling ecosystem accounts. This paper aims to discuss lessons learned, limitations and opportunities based on experience of developing an initial set of marine and coastal accounts for the United Kingdom. The paper reviews and addresses the challenges encountered and offers potential solutions for improving the measurement of marine and coastal ecosystems within accounting frameworks
The Ocean Needs Our Help — Now
No full textOur public seas must play a central role in national climate policy. The ocean, after all, is the planet’s major sequesterer of heat and carbon, as well as the source of vast quantities of carbon-free energy from winds, tides and currents. Coastal communities, from those of Native Alaskans to condo residents in south Florida, are on the frontlines for rising sea level impacts.
A new version of the Build Back Better bill must pass if we are to protect our coastal population.We call on all Democrats and members of the Biden administration to take a deep breath (more than half of our oxygen comes from the ocean) and head back to the negotiating table with clear goals in sight. Manchin says he wants a few domestic spending programs that are funded for a full 10 years, instead of a larger number of proposals with differing end dates.
That’s acceptable. What is nonnegotiable are the climate policies needed for the U.S. to meet its greenhouse gas reduction targets and rebuild our economy in a secure and just manner, from sea to shining sea
From Monterey to Galway: Evolution of the Oceans in National Income Accounts
Full text linkThis paper provides an introduction and overview of selected papers from the 5th International Symposium on the Oceans in National Income Accounts organized by the Socio-Economics Marine Research Unit at the National University of Ireland Galway in March 2021. Eleven papers drawn from the symposium are included in this volume. The papers cover the current status of defining the ocean economy within national accounts, the expansion of ocean accounting to include environmental economic values, and methodological tools to assist the integration
CBE Waves Newsletter: January 2022
Full text linkThe Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary; The Evolution of Thinking on the Ocean Economy, Journal of Ocean and Coastal Economics, Volume 8, Issue 2; The Middlebury Climate Change Semester: Inaugural Program Begins; The Ocean Needs Our Help-No
Adherence to Best Practices for Stated Preference Valuation within the U.S. Marine Ecosystem Services Literature
Full text linkNon-market economic values derived from stated preference (SP) methods are often of interest for policy analysis and evaluation, program design, green accounting, and damage assessments and are increasingly in demand with adoption of ecosystem-based management approaches that emphasize accounting for ecosystem services and their values. A recent guidance prescribes a set of twenty-three best practices guidelines (BPGs) to follow when conducting a SP study to ensure the validity of the results and maximize its ability to provide reliable economic value information. In this article, we evaluate adherence to these guidelines within the U.S. SP marine ecosystem service valuation literature. Our results suggest adherence by the literature to the guidelines is heterogeneous with none of the studies examined adhering to all guidelines and some guidelines being adhered to better than others. Evidence points to adherence differences between older and more recent studies, between studies using different SP valuation methods, and between studies valuing recreation ecosystem services and ones valuing other ecosystem services. Furthermore, a citation analysis suggests studies addressing elements embodied in the BPGs tend to have more citations all else being equal. We discuss several challenges to valuing marine ecosystem services and areas for improvement and inquiry
Exploring South Korea’s Ocean Economy : the Korea National Ocean Economy Survey 2017-2019
Full text linkAs the economic contribution of the ocean and fisheries industry increases, it is essential to identify industrial characteristics and propose specialized strategies based on data. However, there has been a lack of research on the establishment of an industrial classification system that reflects the characteristics of the ocean and fisheries industry in South Korea. Therefore, this study aims to introduce the specialized classification system of the ocean and fisheries industry and, further intends to analyze industry trends using the survey data based on the classification system. For the past three years (2017-2019) 9,000 businesses were surveyed annually to estimate industry revenues, number of businesses and workers, annual labor costs, and business outlook. As a result, this study proposed the need for government support for the shipbuilding and offshore plant construction & repair industry which has great economic ripple effects, and the need to strengthen the labor supply chain of the fishery industries that are easily affected by external shocks
Development of Ocean Economy Satellite Account in Korea
Full text linkThe ocean has emerged as a new solution to new growth engines. However, some issues remain to be resolved, such as unified concepts and evaluation methods for the ocean economy, comparability between the national economy and the ocean economy, and the connection between global and national assessments. Since the ocean economy comprises various complex industries, it is necessary to establish policies based on an objective analysis of economic indicators. However, there have been difficulties in analyzing industrial activities related to the ocean economy within the national account system. To more accurately calculate the share of the ocean economy sector in the national economy, it is necessary to create a satellite account that reflects the characteristics of the ocean economic activities while maintaining consistency with the national account. This study aims to develop a satellite account for the ocean economy, a measurement of GDP in the ocean sector, which can correspond with the national accounts system and intends to propose Korean practices as a framework in the process of discussing international guidelines. This study introduces a potential structure for Korea\u27s ocean economy satellite account, the principles, methods, and data used for value coefficient estimation, and finally presents pilot results for several components of the ocean economy. This account can be utilized to diagnose the economic position as well as the policy effects of Korea’s ocean economy sector while contributing to the establishment of mid-to-long term industrial policies. This case study of Korean practices can be an important example that offers a framework and principles for international discussions
The Cutty Sark
No full textThe Cutty Sark, now a museum in dry dock in Greenwich, England, held the record as the fastest tea clipper in the 19th Century.https://cbe.miis.edu/homepage_carousel/1029/thumbnail.jp
Key Considerations for the Development of Internationally Comparable Statistics on Ocean Economic Activity
Full text linkAlongside several member countries, the OECD is embarking upon the development of a satellite account for ocean economic activity that presents international statistics in a harmonised manner. This work complements other initiatives at national and international levels and will support future comprehensive ocean accounts that include marine environment-economy linkages and ecosystem services. The production of internationally comparable statistics is a complex and time consuming endeavour that requires international cooperation. For ocean economic activities, such difficulties are compounded by the need to break down existing statistical information using secondary source material. A key preparation for internationally comparable statistics on ocean economic activity is for compilers of national data to record and publish metadata that are exhaustive of the statistical data produced. Novel approaches, including those that make sense of high frequency data using machine learning, could offer a potential solution to some of the problems associated with ocean economy measurement
Challenges in measuring indicators of progress for the Atlantic Action Plan
Full text linkThe EU Atlantic Action Plan (AAP) has recently been updated and revised to support ‘blue growth’ along Europe’s western coastal regions. The revisions reflect recent challenges facing the Atlantic Arc maritime economies including the Covid-19 crisis, Brexit and the new requirements of the European Green Deal. This new revision, termed AAP 2.0, also addresses some of the weaknesses highlighted in the original Atlantic Action Plan particularly regarding identifying indicators that may be used to measure progress in the achievement of the Plan’s objectives. Using a database with comparable marine socio-economic data across the Atlantic regions, a number of indicators are identified that may be used to monitor progress of the AAP 2.0. Recent trends and spatial distributions across the Atlantic Arc region are shown for these indicators. The challenges in measuring progress are also highlighted, including where some AAP objectives and associated indicators may conflict with other EU policy aims and where the current monitoring framework can be bolstered with the inclusion of new indicators