Researchers analyse 'the environmentalist's paradox'
Global degradation of ecosystems is widely believed to threaten human welfare, yet accepted measures of well-being show that it is on average improving globally, both in poor countries and rich ones. A team of authors writing in the September issue of BioScience dissects explanations for this 'environmentalist's paradox.' Noting that understanding the paradox is 'critical to guiding future management of ecosystem services,' Ciara Raudsepp-Hearne and her colleagues confirm that improvements in aggregate well-being are real, despite convincing evidence of ecosystem decline. Three likely reasons they identify - past increases in food production, technological innovations that decouple people from ecosystems, and time lags before well-being is affected - provide few grounds for complacency, however...
