'Nature's services' is an umbrella term for the ways in which nature benefits humans, particularly those benefits that can be measured in economic terms. Robert Costanza and other theorists of natural capital conducted extensive economic analysis of nature's services to humanity in the 1990s. The economic contribution of seventeen of these was found to be approximately US$33 trillion per year, greater than the activities in the inter-human economy, which totaled about US$25 trillion. This was based on estimated costs of replacing the services nature provides, with equivalent services using methods wholly based on human infrastructure. For alternative meanings, see nature (disambiguation). ... Natural capital refers to the mineral, plant, and animal formations of the Earths biosphere when viewed as a means of production of oxygen, water filter, erosion preventer, or provider of other natural services. ... Economics is the social science studying production and consumption through measurable variables. ... Human beings are defined variously in biological, spiritual, and cultural terms, or in combinations thereof. ... Events and trends Technology Explosive growth of the Internet; decrease in the cost of computers and other technology Reduction in size and cost of mobile phones leads to a massive surge in their popularity Year 2000 problem (commonly known as Y2K) Microsoft Windows operating system becomes virtually ubiquitous on IBM...

This study has been widely cited in natural capital, value of Earth and value of life debates. It is a cornerstone of human development theory and Natural Capitalism. It has also had broad influence on theories of service economy, which redefine commodity markets and brand name product sales strictly as services: for example, governments providing means of protection of the natural capital which automatically provides such services as: Natural capital refers to the mineral, plant, and animal formations of the Earths biosphere when viewed as a means of production of oxygen, water filter, erosion preventer, or provider of other natural services. ... In economics, value of Earth is the ultimate in ecosystem valuation, and important to value of life calculations. ... The value of life is an economic or moral value assigned to life in general, or to specific living organisms. ... Human development theory is an economic theory that merges older ideas from ecological economics, sustainable development, welfare economics, and feminist economics. ... Natural capitalism is a set of trends and economic reforms to reward energy and material efficiency - and remove professional standards and accounting conventions that prevent such efficiencies. ... Service economy can refer to one or both of two recent economic developments. ... This article is in need of attention. ... This article is about brands in marketing. ... In marketing, a product is anything that can be offered to a market that might satisfy a want or need. ... A means of protection is some contract or guarantee of security for body or property. ...

• erosion prevention
• water filtering
• pollination
• game habitat
• wildlife corridor
• pest control

Worldwatch Institute, World Resource Institute, Rocky Mountain Institute, Greenpeace, and various United Nations agencies, along with a few governments (including the United Kingdom and Canada) are actively expanding the analysis, with an eye to producing UN standards for valuating natural capital. This is anticipated to have a major effect on money supply debates, as the creation of money by banks for purposes of funding ecosystem depletion has become a major global governance issue, of importance equivalent to land reform, developing nation debt and terrorism. In combination, these are thought by some theorists, including Thomas Homer-Dixon, to be closely related to ecological depletion and heightened competition for scarce natural resources. If the nature's services analysis is valid, then humans also compete to protect the natural capital which in turn provides them services they cannot pay for in a cash economy. Funding its depletion thus creates a vicious cycle. Pollination is an important step in the reproduction of seed plants: the transfer of pollen grains (male gametes) to the plant carpel, the structure that contains the ovule (female gamete). ... A wildlife corridor is the artificial joining of fragmented habitats. ... Pest control refers to the regulation or management of another species defined as a pest, usually because it is detrimental to a persons health, the ecology or the economy. ... The Worldwatch Institute bills itself as an independent research organization that works for an environmentally sustainable and socially just society, in which the needs of all people are met without threatening the health of the natural environment or the well-being of future generations. ... According to its web site, Rocky Mountain Institute is an entrepreneurial nonprofit organization that fosters the efficient and restorative use of natural, human and other capital to make the world more secure, just, prosperous, and life-sustaining. ... Greenpeace is an international environmental organization founded in Canada in 1971. ... The United Nations, or UN, is an international organization made up of 191 states established in 1945. ... Canada is a sovereign state in northern North America, the northern-most country in the world, and the second largest in total area. ... Natural capital refers to the mineral, plant, and animal formations of the Earths biosphere when viewed as a means of production of oxygen, water filter, erosion preventer, or provider of other natural services. ... Money supply (monetary aggregates, money stock), a macroeconomic concept, is the quantity of money available within the economy to purchase goods, services, and securities. ... Land reform (also agrarian reform) is the government-initiated or government-backed transfer of ownership of (or tenure in) agricultural land. ... Terrorism refers to the use of violence for the purpose of achieving a political, religious, or ideological goal. ... Natural resources are commodities that are considered valuable in their relatively unmodified (natural) form. ... Natural capital refers to the mineral, plant, and animal formations of the Earths biosphere when viewed as a means of production of oxygen, water filter, erosion preventer, or provider of other natural services. ... In many parts of economics there is an assumption that a complex system of determinants will tend to lead to a state of equilibrium. ...

However, this debate appears to have had little influence on monetary policy or on WTO, IMF or G8 economic and trade policy. The anti-globalization movement, ecology movement, peace movement, and conservation movement, and their political ally the Green movement are increasingly vocal about the need to reflect the value of these services directly in real policy. Such an approach would, for example, mean not funding such projects as the Three Gorges Dam which directly deplete and disrupt ecoregions on a huge scale. This debate precedes economic analysis of the services, which was in part motivated by the observation that human instinct and economic analysis very often yielded quite different impressions of the value of such ecosystems. This article or section should include material from Monetary policy of central banks. ... For other uses of the initials WTO, see WTO (disambiguation). ... The flag of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is the international organization entrusted with overseeing global financial system‘s current trade account balances of member states. ... G8 (disambiguation). ... Anti-globalization (anti-globalisation) is a political stance of opposition to the perceived negative aspects of globalization. ... The global ecology movement is one of several new social movements that emerged at the end of the sixties, its growth has been stimulated by the widespread acknolagement of the ecological crisis of our planet. ... The global peace movement refers to a sense of common purpose among organizations that seek to end wars and minimize inter-human violence, usually through pacifism, non-violent resistance, diplomacy, boycott, moral purchasing and demonstrating. ... The Conservation movement was an American invention of John Audubon and others who invoked Christian reverence for the Creation to protect natural habitat from man in the 19th century. ... This article needs cleanup. ... The Three Gorges Dam (Chinese: 三峡大坝; pinyin: Sānxiá Dàbà) spans the Yangtze at Sandouping, Yichang, Hubei province, China. ... An ecoregion is a relatively large area of land or water that contains a geographically distinct assemblage of natural communities. ...

One criticism of this analysis is that it is largely conducted by those who have some association with Gaia philosophy and human development theory and one or more political movements seen to have an ideological bias in favor of a higher valuation for nature's services than would be implied by a more neutral point of view. Accordingly, many of the debates now focus on metrics and indicators on which both advocates and detractors of monetary reform can agree. These are in general indistinguishable from debates about measuring well-being to determine what constitutes real inflation, that is, the amount of money required to live the same way, and other debates regarding the social welfare function and what constitutes wealth. Gaia philosophy (named after Gaia, the Greek goddess of the Earth) is a broadly inclusive term for related concepts that living organisms on a planet will affect the nature of their environment – to make it more suitable for life. ... Human development theory is an economic theory that merges older ideas from ecological economics, sustainable development, welfare economics, and feminist economics. ... An ideology is a collection of ideas. ... Bias has several different meanings, most relating to an offset or prejudice of some sort. ... Shortcut: WP:NPOV Wikipedia policy is that all articles should be written from a neutral point of view. ... Monetary reform is accounting reform that reaches more deeply into banking central bank, money supply and monetary policy. ... The well-being or quality of life of a population is an important concern in economics and political science. ... Inflation rates of five core members of the G8 from 1950 to 1994. ... A social welfare function, in welfare economics, is a function which gives a measure of the material welfare of society, given a number of economic variables as inputs. ... Wealth usually refers to money and property. ...

See also

• Experience Economy
• Value of Earth
• ISO 14000
• peace and conflict theory