from The Guardian, 13 November 2013
The first ‘World Forum on Natural Capital’ later this month is due to attract business and conservation leaders from across the globe to debate how to give natural resources a monetary value in order to try and protect them. It is due to be addressed by the First Minister, Alex Salmond.
But it has now sparked unexpected opposition from a coalition of environmental and development groups across Europe. They are planning a “counter forum” to combat the idea that nature should become a commodity to be traded by business.
The official conference may also attract some street theatre lampooning the idea of natural capital, though organisers stress that there are no plans to disrupt proceedings. In addition, the world forum’s headline sponsor, the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), has drawn criticism from environmental groups concerned at the bank’s multi-billion pound backing for climate-polluting companies.
All this is potentially awkward for the Scottish Wildlife Trust, the environmental group organising the forum. It says, however, that it welcomes debate and argues that environmentalists have to get out of their “comfort zone”.
The counter forum has been planned for 21 November in the middle of the official conference by three groups campaigning against big business involvement in protecting the planet. Under banner "nature is not for sale”, it is being coordinated by the World Development Movement (WDM) in Scotland.
“The presence of big business, such as RBS, Coca Cola, Rio Tinto and KPMG, at the World Forum on Natural Capital exposes the event’s real purpose - putting a price on nature so that a small minority can profit,” said WDM’s UK director, Nick Dearden.
“Billions of people around the world depend on free access to forests, rivers and fertile soils for their survival. Putting a price on these common resources leaves all of us more exposed to the forces of the global economy.”
Counter Balance, which brings together groups from half a dozen countries across Europe, argued that nature was a common good. “We are not willing to turn nature into a commodity that is sold to the highest bidder,” said the group’s director, Xavier Sol.
Antonio Tricarico from the Italian campaign group, Re:Common, accused the financial elite of scrambling to make a profit from nature. “If you are managing nature as a business, chances are real that it goes bust one day,” he said. “Nature is too valuable to take that risk.”
The forum’s sponsorship by RBS was criticised by Dr Richard Dixon, the director of Friends of the Earth Scotland. “Until RBS unveils a plan for how they are going to get out of supporting fossil fuels and increase their support for green energy they cannot be seen as a credible sponsor for this conference,” he said.
RBS declined to comment, but the forum’s programme director and head of conservation at the Scottish Wildlife Trust, Jonathan Hughes, mounted a stout defence. “If we are to make a real difference and address these impacts in a meaningful way, there needs to be an open discussion and the corporate world needs to be part of the solution,” he said.
He suggested that environmentalists sometimes spent too much time talking amongst themselves. “If we are to reverse ecosystem degradation and potentially catastrophic biodiversity loss, we need move out of our comfort zone, and we need to move fast,“ he argued.
He pointed out that the forum was backed by a wide range of governmental and non-governmental organisations, including WWF and Conservation International. It was not looking at how markets might be constructed for elements of natural capital, he said.
“Nature may be priceless, but it is not valueless, and there is now a broad acceptance amongst the majority of environmental charities that as long as the value of nature remains invisible in economic decision making, corporate and government sectors will simply continue to generate financial profits by running up a massive natural capital overdraft.”
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