Natural Resources And Environmental Accounts

The ONS recently published the UK's environmental accounts for 2011 and they are described as satellite accounts to the main national accounts. They provide information on a wide range of things to do with atmospheric emissions, natural resources such as lands cover, oil and gas reserves, forestry, trade in basic materials, physical flows and monetary accounts related to the industrial, commercial and domestic sectors.

The effects of our activity on the environment have been an important policy issue for the last 40-50 years. There is growing concern about the impact of economic activity on both the global and local environment and also recognition that economic growth and human welfare depend on the enviroment. Raw materials and energy for goods and services, the absorption of waste, basic life support roles and amenities such as landscape are all services provided by the environment.

Environmental accounts provide data on the impact of economic activity on the environment, resource use and the taxes and subsidies associted with them and are sepearated into three dimensions: natural resources, physical flows and monetary. Natural resources accounts include oil and gas reserves, land cover and forestry.

Proven oil reserves at the end of 2009 were 378m tonnes. There has been a transfer of 38m tonnes from probable to proven reserves. Maximum oil reserves (proven, probable and possible) decreased by 19m tonnes to 1,111m tonnes in 2009. There are estimated to be hundreds of millions of tonnes of undiscovered recoverable oil reserves. Oil and gas reserves were worth an estimated value of £182.4bn in 2009, down 1.9% since 2008.

Total land cover in Great Britain is 22.6m hectares. Various types of grassland are the habitats that have increased between 1998 and 2007. Changes have also taken place in woodlands which have increased, arable and horticulture, which have decreased and bracken broad habitat which has also decreased.

The total area covered by woodland was 3.1m hectares or 12.7% of UK land area and is the highest since records began. The woodland area at the end of 2010 is 2.5 times tha area covered in 1924 (when records began). The area of new planting and restocking in 2010-11 was 22,700 hectares. Broadleaved species important for the expansion of the area of native woodland was 82% of new planting but only 27% of restocking.

There was an 8.4% decrease in greenhouse gas emissions in 2009 compared with 2008 bringing the total down by 58.1m tonnes to 636m tonnes of CO2 equivalent.

Material productivity is used to assess progress towards sustainable development by dividing GDP by Domestic Material Consumption (DMC). The environmental accounts show that between 1990 and 2009 material productivity increrased and the trend indicates that material use is falling in relation to economic activity and supports evidence that suggests that economic growth has decoupled from material use since 1990. Some of the environmental impacts associated with consumption may have been transferred abroad because the level of imports has generally risen over that period.

Information Exchange In Natural Resources

The first expert meeting on the sharing of information on natural resources, the Natural Resources Information Exchange (NRIE), took place in Benin in July this year (2010) and attracted representatives from 24 African countries. The African continent is rich in mineral resources. Information sharing can help African governments manage their natural resources efficiently and can help in poverty reduction.

World Trade Report Calls For Natural Resource Trade Co-operation

The World Trade Report from the WTO says natural resources trade is creating many challenges for importing and exporting countries and co-operation by governments is required if they are to be addressed adequately.

The focus of the report is natural resources such as fuels, forestry, mining and fisheries and it examines the trade characteristics of natural resource markets, policy choices and international co-operation for proper management with particular reference to WTO.

Key elements of the report include the distinctive features of natural resource markets, gains from resources trade, externalities, technology effects on sustainability, high volatility, trade policy and trade regulation in natural resources.

The natural resources market total world trade value in 2008 was $3.7 trillion, equivalent to 24% of world merchandise trade. Fuels accounted for 57% in 1998 and 77% in 2008, fish and forestry each accounted for 3% and mining 18%. The top 15 exporters accounted for 52% of world resources trade in 2008 and top 15 importers 71% of traded resources.

New Directions Suggested For Upland Communities

Current support for hill farming is inadequate to sustain the wealth of natural and cultural assets of the English uplands according to the findings of the inquiry into the future of the English uplands by the Commission for Rural Communities (CRC). The CRC suggests new funding mechanisms are required to reward farmers for managing national assets in harmony with a developing business sector. The CRC say the suggested reforms could be part of the Common Agricultural Policy from 2013. They say there is a need to strike a balance between the needs of the environment and maximising the economic potential of the uplands. Thriving communities are an essential part of sustaining natural resources, they say, supporting farmers is not enough.

The report calls an integrated approach to realising the potential of the diverse natural resources of the uplands. It says too many well-intentioned intentions have had negative consequences for communities, farmers and land owners. It also the appointment of someone accountable to ministers to lead the implementation of the new strategy.

Other recommendations include a long-term land managemnt policy to mitigate carbon loss, completion of an audit of opportunities for renewable energy to stimulate new enterprise and opportunities for value addition, taking proper account of upland communities when developing and delivering the Goverment's 'Big Society' programme replacing voluntary and community efforts with committed and reliable measures, development of Next Generation Access in upland areas and guidance on affordable homes.

The uplands are home to over 2 million people with an above average proportion of over 40s, 25% of all woodland and 70% of drinking water comes from the uplands, 75% of the uplands are designated National Park or Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB), 53% of England's Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) are in the uplands and 82% of common land. The 40 million visitors to the upland National Parks spend £1.78bn there every year.