Rwanda launches First Natural Capital Accounts to Inform Economic Planning

March 12, 2017 |

This article was originally published on Wealth Accounting and the Valuation of Ecosystem Services (WAVES).

“Rwanda presented the first results of its Natural Capital Accounting process on February 16^th during a national workshop in Kigali. The results from the first accounts – on the topics of land and water – come after about 18 months of work, as Rwanda is bracing to begin planning for its third Economic Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy, a process that will start in May 2017. The results from the two accounts are expected to inform the national planning process, especially when it comes to including natural resources in economic development and poverty reduction.

“For Rwanda to progress, grow, and manage our economy wisely, we need good measures to evaluate our economic status and performance,” said Dr. Vincent Biruta, Rwanda’s Minister of Natural Resources (pictured at left). “Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is a standard or traditional measure of economic performance, focused on income, the value of goods and services. But it does not give us insight about the underlying wealth and the assets that sustain our income, or the trends in their use or performance.”

He added, “For some time now, we have been keen to evaluate and measure natural assets’ contribution to ensure sustainability. The just-ended National Workshop on Natural Capital Accounting in Rwanda will help us address this challenge. Natural capital accounting gives us an approach and tools that will help us analyze the trends in our underlying natural assets. This tool can inform our efforts to sustain performance through sound management of natural assets.”…”

Read on at: Wealth Accounting and the Valuation of Ecosystem Services (WAVES).

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Introduction from Carl Obst (2017)

Victor Hugo once wrote that “Nothing is so powerful as an idea whose time has come”. Recognising the true value of natural capital, is one such idea. Across private and public sectors, across disciplines, and around the world, initiatives to advance and develop natural capital thinking have emerged rapidly over the past 10 years.

In a blizzard of acronyms, we have the NCC, SEEA, WAVES, IIRC, KIP-INCA, A4S, GRI, EO4EA – among many others. Are they the same, are they competing, are they useful? To both insiders and outsiders this range of initiatives is confusing at best. At worst, it leads to a lack of engagement, avoidance and misunderstanding.

The reality is that, while differences among these various initiatives do exist, they have all been motivated by a common understanding of the reality that we are losing our stocks of natural capital – and that this matters.

While each initiative may have different origins, some differing objectives, and may reflect variations in technique and method, there is much common ground. Indeed, to engage the broader community in tackling the natural capital challenges we collectively face, we cannot afford to focus on distinctions. Instead, we must look to build on the overlaps and seek to build a common language that will enable the exchange of ideas and ongoing innovation.

It is in this spirit of collaboration that the Natural Capital Coalition, together with the IDEEA Group and supported by over 20 organisations, launches this statement on Combining Forces on Natural Capital.

It is especially relevant that this statement of collaboration is launched at the World Forum on Natural Capital, where leading voices in the movement gather every two years, to share best practice, enduring challenges and build further collaborations.

While progress to date has largely taken place in small pockets, in order to move forward we need to ramp up our efforts and move beyond talking with supporters and “the converted”.

For this, we need leaders who can establish spaces for dialogue and development, and who can ensure that technical debates do not form a barrier to progress, that we take full advantage of the diversity of skills and experience already engaged, and that the big picture is always kept in mind.

I encourage you to take the opportunity to read the statement, to share it within your organisations, to sign on, and to join us as we move towards a better understanding and appreciation of the complex and beautiful world in which we live.

Carl Obst is Director of the Institute for the Development of Environmental-Economic Accounting (IDEEA Group), and Lead Author of the United Nation’s System of Environmental-Economic Accounting (UN SEEA).