WAVES News: Linking natural capital accounting to the SDGs

WAVES Newsletter, Issue 47, December 2017

Carola van Rijnsoever, Director of Inclusive Green Growth at the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, welcomed participants to the Second Forum on Natural Capital Accounting for Better Policy. (Photo: Michael Vardon/ANU)

Dear colleagues,

We were recently back in The Hague for the Second Forum on Natural Capital Accounting for Better Policy, where 20 countries shared their experience with NCA and its use for policymaking. It was heartening to see how this NCA community of practice has grown since its founding meeting last year (lessons from that event have been compiled into a publication). The co-organizing team has also expanded, now including the UN Statistics Division (UNSD) in addition to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands and WAVES, and with support from numerous partners.

This time around, the forum centered on using NCA to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). There was also a greater private sector focus, with several sessions led by the Natural Capital Coalition. You can learn more about the meeting's highlights here, and visit the event page to access all of the presentations. In addition, Acting WAVES Manager Sofia Ahlroth participated in the World Forum on Natural Capital, where she shared experiences from WAVES and discussed collaboration opportunities between the public and private sectors in a session called 'Taking Nature into Account.'

WAVES is happy to share news from our former core implementing country, Costa Rica, where the Central Bank is routinely updating and publishing accounts in parallel with their national accounts. You can find out about their latest water and energy accounts here. Costa Rica is also one of the countries featured in our new series of policy briefs, along with Botswana, Colombia, Indonesia, and the Philippines. There are also three briefs focused on using NCA for policy in the water, energy and climate change, and forest sectors.

Australia has been a forerunner on NCA and is keeping up the momentum. The first set of accounts has been released for the Victorian Central Highlands - a region whose carbon-dense forests provide water for all of Melbourne, and are a source of tourism revenue. The accounts are already proving to be a valuable tool for forest management policies.

All the best for 2018,

The WAVES Team

News from the WAVES Partnership

Realising the value of accounting for the forests of the Victorian Central Highlands, Australia

Accounts highlight the benefits from plantations and natural forests, to inform forest management policies.

Making the link between the SDGs and natural capital accounting

Participants gathered in The Hague for the Second Forum on Natural Capital Accounting for Better Policy.

Natural capital accounting and policy

New briefs demonstrate the progress of five WAVES countries, and also look at three thematic areas: forests, water and energy.

New in the Knowledge Center

WAVES:

Forum on Natural Capital Accounting for Better Policy Decisions: Taking Stock and Moving Forward

European Environment Agency:

Landscapes in transition: An account of 25 years of land cover change in Europe

Inter-American Development Bank:

A Quantitative Assessment of Strategies to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals

News from our Partners

Water Accounts for Samoa: 2014-2015

Samoa released a report with information on the physical supply and use of water in the economy. The account is compiled in accordance with the System of Environmental Economic Accounting.

Costa Rica shares latest update of environmental accounts

The accounts, carried out by the Banco Central de Costa Rica, show an improvement in energy efficiency and a reduction of carbon dioxide emissions derived from energy use, while the percentage of physical water losses by water utilities remains stable.

WAVES Voices

"NCA matches well the cross-sectoral nature of the SDGs; at its core, it's an integrative system of information across issues such as economic growth, employment, use of natural resources, pollution, financial aspects, and income allocation."

- Carola van Rijnsoever, Director of Inclusive Green Growth at the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, speaking at the Second Forum on Natural Capital Accounting for Better Policy in The Hague on November 22, 2017.