Options for the Structure of Part III on Applications of the Revised SEE 2003

1. Rocky HarrisUnited Kingdom Revision of SEEA 2003 Options for the structure of Part III on applications

2. Four options • Status quo (order used in SEEA 2003) • Natural resource classification • Environmental issue • Policy cycle

3. 1. Status quo – existing chapter 11 • Activities which lead to degradation of environmental media, using physical and hybrid flow accounts from chapters 3 and 4 • Responses to degradation through defensive expenditures and development of economic instruments (chapters 5 and 6) • National wealth and changes due to depletion of natural resources (chapters 7 and 8) • Use of pricing techniques to determine cost-effectiveness of policies (chapter 9) • Adjustments to macro-economic aggregates (chapter 10)

4. Option 1: status quo • Organised by the order of chapters • Further divided by indicators/analysis • Good showcase of how accounts are used • Lacks sense of how approaches from different chapters can deal with the same environmental issue

5. 2. Natural resource classification • Natural resources (mineral and energy, soil, water including surface water, biological) • Land and surface water (developed land, agricultural land, wooded land, major water bodies, other land) • Ecosystems (terrestrial, aquatic and atmospheric systems) Also intangible environmental assets

6. Option 2: natural resource classification • Classification by environmental asset • Main policy focus – climate change – is a subset of ‘atmospheric ecosystem’ • Some overlap between items in policy terms e.g. water • Lacks clear relationship to policy concerns

7. 3. Environmental issues – SD indicators • Atmosphere (4 indicators) • Land (10 indicators) • Oceans, seas and coasts (6 indicators) • Fresh water (5 indicators) • Biodiversity (7 indicators) • Consumption and production patterns (14 indicators)

8. Option 3: environmental issues • No ready classification - could be by reference to groupings of SD indicators • Would be well-related to policy concerns • Good opportunity to link approaches from different chapters … • … but may entail some repetition of analytical methods • Focus on indicators may mean some accounts not readily shown

9. Continuous improvement Base data availability and analysis The policy process and the evidence base Information about target area and analysis Monitoring and evaluation data and analysis Data and analysis of alternative options Development of indicators, evidence and analysis

10. 4. The policy cycle • Identification of problem • Information about target areas • Assessment of policy options and setting of targets • Monitoring and evaluation

11. 4. SEEA and the policy cycle

12. Option 4: policy cycle • Organised by type of evidence required • Treats different environmental issues in uniform way • Could demonstrate integrated nature of the accounts • But don’t policy users generally only think in silos?

13. Summary of options

14. Conclusion: a hybrid structure? A three part structure: • Environmental issue – degradation of climate, water, land, biodiversity (chapters 3 and 4, also 9). Would provide the main link to the section on indicators. Could incorporate applications relating to stocks (chapters 7 and 8) and elements of applications relating to taxes and expenditures (chapters 5 and 6), to the extent that such applications were relevant to the environmental issue being covered; • Environmental resources – renewables, non-renewables, etc, mainly based on chapters 7 and 8, to the extent that they were not covered in the previous part • Other applications – taxes, expenditures, emission rights etc, from chapters 5 and 6, to the extent that they were not covered in the previous parts