What is WAVES?
WAVES stands for Wealth Accounting and the Valuation of Ecosystem Services.
What is wealth accounting?
Wealth Accounting measures three forms of assets and capital goods that a country generates: 1. Manufactured capital such as buildings and public infrastructure; 2.
But Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is the recognized measure of economic growth. Why change it?
Countries rely on GDP as a measure of its economic performance. However, GDP only measures current income and production. It tells us nothing about income for the long term.
What is natural capital accounting and why is it important for a country like the Philippines?
Natural capital includes the resources that we easily recognize and measure such as minerals, agricultural land and fisheries.
How can wealth accounting help countries grow sustainably?
Comprehensive wealth accounting can provide an estimate of the total wealth of nations by measuring the value of these different components of wealth.
What will the Phil-WAVES project do for the Philippines?
A more sustainable use of natural resources could potentially have a large impact on growth through reducing poverty and risks from natural disasters and climate change.
Who is working on the Phil-WAVES project?
The Phil-WAVES project is being led by the National Economic and Development Authority and the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) through a technical assistance grant given by the World Bank.
What is natural capital?
Natural capital includes all of the resources that we easily recognize and measure, like minerals,energy, timber, agricultural land, fisheries and water.
Why does natural capital matter for economic growth? Isn’t GDP enough?
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) measures the value of goods and services produced over one year.
What are NCA? How are they different from the accounts that countries keep now?
Natural Capital Accounts (NCA) are sets of unbiased data for material natural resources, such as forests, energy and water.
What is natural capital accounting and why is it important for a country like the Philippines?
Natural capital includes the resources that we easily recognize and measure such as minerals, agricultural land and fisheries.
How are natural capital accounts used?
The Wealth Accounting and Valuation of Ecosystem Services (WAVES) is a global partnership, announced by World Bank President Robert B. Zoellick in Nagoya, Japan, in 2010.
Isn’t valuing natural capital really about privatizing nature?
Natural Capital Accounting is about measurement and information—for example, determining how much water is being used by which sector. The objective is to use this information for better government decision-making.
What results have WAVES countries achieved so far?
As recently as 2010, NCA was mostly limited to high-income countries.
Why was Southern Palawan chosen as the pilot site for the ecosystem account?
Southern Palawan is an area that is highly mineralized, has rich levels of biodiversity, relatively rich fishing grounds supported by extensive mangrove forests, seagrass beds and coral reefs.
What was the data produced for Southern Palawan and who were involved?
The variety of ecosystem services supplied and the need to address competing resource use claims makes Southern Palawan an excellent case study area for testing the ecosystem accounting approach.
But we already know about deforestation, what is new?
True, but this is the first time that we have scientific evidence-based information that will tell us a number of things.
