Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Marine Biodiversity valuation
As any other natural resource marine resources too have immense value and utility even on encashable terms. In a way the valuation and budgeting of the marine resources is very much a priority for any avid policy watcher. But unlike its superterranean counterparts the marine ecosystem has lot of things waiting to be unshrouded. Practically none of the pivotal factors worth its utility in budgeting them can be assessed in the mathematical sense. Unlike forests and other animal resources marine resources have unique set of dynamics at every part of their biology. At times quite a few species have shown extreme sense of resilience especially against adversity so much so that post threat certain species have over dominated unusually. Further most of these resources are in a state of flux. So this topic needs careful intellectual assuaging before being unleashed in zones hitherto bereft of such studies.
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MBV is a very complex and difficult proposition and I doubt whether with our existing infrastructure we will be able to value our marine biodivesity in its entirety. However, we can develop proxies (or indicators) based on the resources (living and non-living)exploited from our seas around us. I am not an expert on this. But this is my humble opinion. The contribution of marine fish production to our country's GDP can be taken as an index of value of the marine fish biodiversity at current prices(?). Since the marine fishery has not had any significant changes during the last 5 years, the average contribution of marine fish production can be taken as an index of exploited marine biodiversity value.
ReplyDeleteIn my view, this is a really difficult but quite important question. Marine biodiversity itself is so poorly known still. For example, the Census of Marine Life is discovering so many new species in every realm of the oceans, as well as showing that marine microbes have huge diversity (bacteria, viruses, etc). (See http://www.coml.org, and http://icomm.mbl.edu/).
ReplyDeleteHowever, I think the most under-appreciated and perhaps most important value of marine biodiversity is in climate services delivered by life in the oceans. If they could ever be properly valued - but how? - they might outweigh even the fisheries value. Of course, this is not a directly exploited value, such as fisheries.
adding an economic tag to whatever we deem worth doing is a recent intellectual fad...What is the actual practical use of such exercises? What way it helps the man who is becoming greedier by moment to have a conservation ethic? On the contrary , more the value more his/her efforts to exploit them...that the biodiversity is more valuabe than the fisheries make anyone switch off the tastebuds for fish? does anyone switch off the AC in his room? ( or goad him/her to lead a more climate-friendly life?
ReplyDeleteramchandran
The point raised by Dr Ramachandran is pertinent in the sense that whenever the opportunity utility or opportunity costs of an activity is worked out barely thought is given for the importance of the activity vis-a-vis its inevitability. When more mouths have to be fed probably more biota have to be consumed, it is as simple as it. In one of the presentations on valuing biodiversity I happened to read a point stating that grazing by cattle leads to loss of biodiversity. A chronic nature lover in me finds this point hard to digest. As a popular saying in India goes "the more you tap an aquifer the more you get to drink". In some cases pruning helps in the rejuvenation of plants, well certainly not uprooting it. Probably juxtaposing fishing alongside bio diversity conservation smacks some sort of unrealistic arrogance on the part of researchers.
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