This report summarises the first results of the Global Futures initiative—a partnership between WWF, the Global Trade Analysis Project, and the Natural Capital Project—that has developed an innovative new model to calculate the impacts of nature’s decline on the world’s economies, trade, and industry. The research is timely and poses a stark warning to us all – that unless we reverse nature loss, trillions of dollars will be wiped off the world’s economies, industries will be disrupted, and the lives of millions will be affected.
The research considers the benefits that nature provides to all nations and industries through ecosystem services such as the pollination of crops, protection of coasts from flooding and erosion, supply of water, timber production, marine fisheries, and carbon storage. The model then assesses how the natural assets that provide these services (such as forests, wetlands, coral reefs, and fish stocks) would change under various future development scenarios and, in turn, how the consequent changes in ecosystem service supply would affect economic outcomes (including GDP, trade, production, and commodity prices). The analysis is based on an innovative economic modelling approach that combines a global economic model with high-resolution land use and ecosystem service models. This powerful analytical tool, which covers 140 regions / countries and all key economic sectors, identifies the potential future global, national, and sectoral economic impacts that will occur due to changes in the Earth’s natural systems under a range of different global development scenarios.
This report comes at a critical time, marking the start of a landmark year for the future of the planet. During 2020, political leaders and negotiators will meet to discuss a series of important global policy outcomes regarding nature, climate and development. As last year’s landmark global assessment from the Intergovernmental Science-policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) warned, and this report underlines, current levels of ambition are not enough. This report urges for a transformational change across economic and financial systems, in order to gear towards delivering long-term sustianable development.