Natuurlijk kapitaal als verbindend principe voor maatschappelijke uitdagingen

Patrick Bogaart, Lars Hein, Dirk-Jan van der Hoek, Rixt de Jong, Linda de Jongh, Bart de Knegt, Remon Koopman, Marjolein Lof, Ton de Nijs, Martina Paulin, Sjoerd Schenau & Joop van Bodegraven

natuurlijk kapitaal, ecosysteemdiensten, synergie, afruil, integratie

Het dichtbevolkte Nederland kent een groot aantal ruimtelijke opgaven, waarbij een spanningsveld ontstaat tussen natuur, economie en maatschappij. Dit artikel beschrijft hoe het concept natuurlijk kapitaal een bijdrage kan leveren aan integrale oplossingen voor beleidsopgaven rondom stikstof, klimaat, landbouw en biodiversiteit, en daarbij een verbindend principe kan vormen.

A natural connection – Natural capital as a binding principle for societal challenges.

Natural capital, ecosystem services, synergy, trade-offs, integration

The related concepts of natural capital and ecosystem services can help in connecting policies on biodiversity, regenerative agriculture, nitrogen deposition and climate mitigation. These connections are either tradeoffs between individual ecosystem services, or synergies.
An example of agriculture versus ecology is used to illustrate the added value of regenerative, nature-inclusive agriculture to maximize total benef its across sectors.
We present a series of accounting and modelling tools that support policy monitoring (ex-post) and development
(ex-ante), focusing on three types of relevant questions: What are the current state and trends of natural capital? What are the expected future trends given future scenarios; and how can natural capital concepts be harnessed to develop nature-based solutions to current
challenges in spatial planning?
The SEEA ecosystem accounting method has been applied to assess the current state of natural capital in the Netherlands, focusing on a selected set of ecosystem services. This analysis revealed that cultural ecosystem services such as recreation and hedonic pricing of real
estate make up the lion’s share of the monetary value. The Natural Capital Model has been used to support the implementation of the EU habitat and bird directives, showing that policies aiming at only enhancement of habitat areas results in little synergy in terms of an enhanced
flow of ecosystem services. On a local scale, the model has been used to assess the societal benefits resulting from additional and improved urban green areas within the city of Amsterdam. By overlaying maps of ecosystem service potential and landscape characteristics options for synergy and nature-based solutions can be regionalized.

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