Evidence or Action

The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment highlighted the importance of environmental preservation for continued economic activity and well-being of communities (Fig. 1). It inventoried services provided by ecosystems, as well as quantifying these in order to assess their contribution to human well-being. The approach is based on the conviction that it is necessary to be able to quantify the productivity of ecosystems. This will in the end enable policymakers to consider environmental protection as a parameter when determining the priorities for action within processes of arbitration between different economic development projects having greater or lesser positive impacts on the environment and human well-being.