Controversial biodiversity credit scheme proposed

A habitat banking system and biodiversity credits would scale up private investment to effectively protect biodiversity while promoting the economy, according to a recent report.

Investment manager and advisory group, Climate Change Capital, and a leading environmental economic consultancy, Eftec, recommend the UK Government introduce a standard unit for credits and establish exchange rates where organisations that damage important habitats would have to buy credits to offset their destruction.

Authors of the report anticipate that adoption of the method would help the UK meet biodiversity loss reduction rates for 2020, which includes at least halving the loss of natural habitats. The European Union failed to meet biodiversity loss reduction rates for 2010.

Via the habitat banking system, society would be compensated for its environmental loss by a developer paying to create or restore an area of habitat elsewhere. The system would be similar to a carbon trading scheme, and is controversial for similar reasons. Focus would be placed on offsetting damage rather than the conservation, required to protect land and biodiversity.

The 'Habitat Banking Report: Scaling Up Private Investment in the Protection and Restoration of our Natural World’ suggests dividing biodiversity up into tiers based on the level of protection necessary to conserve different species.

Ben Caldecott, head of UK and EU policy at Climate Change Capital said: "Designing a credible habitat banking system is a real opportunity to scale up investment in the protection and restoration of our natural world.

"The way money has been raised historically – primarily through public sector expenditure or voluntary donations to charities – while important, is highly unlikely to generate the scale of capital needed to finally halt the loss of biodiversity, or turn the tide through ecological restoration.”

In order to create an environmental market, such as those in the US, Australia, New Zealand and The Netherlands, the authors say that UK laws must be adapted, making more money from the private sector available for investment.

Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme asserts: “Our goal has to be halting the loss of biodiversity. Can we already agree on targets and timelines that lead us to that over the course of a decade? It will be an immense struggle.”

The Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) says it is looking into the biodiversity offsetting system as part of a white paper which will be published in the Spring.

Image: WorldIslandInfo.com