ASSESSMENT OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECT OF IMPLEMENTATION OF OFFSET SCHEMES FOR ECOSYSTEM LOSSES

Abstract

Biodiversity offsets are economic instruments used to allow for some continued economic development whilst simultaneously delivering biodiversity objectives, such as no net loss or net gain. The evidence available to date points to somewhat mixed results in terms of the environmental effectiveness of existing biodiversity offset schemes. This is due not to the instrument itself, however, but rather to how these schemes have been designed and implemented in practice. The purpose of the article is to determine approaches and criteria for assessing the environmental effect of applying offset schemes for losses of ecosystems with special natural value when implementing economic development projects. The objectives of offset schemes are the conservation of biodiversity, ecosystems, their elements and ecosystem services. It is proposed to use the approach of assessing ecosystem assets when assessing the environmental result of the implementation of offset schemes for ecosystem losses: assessment of changes in ecosystem area; assessment of changes in the state of ecosystems. Biodiversity offsets are economic instruments used to allow for some continued economic development whilst simultaneously delivering biodiversity objectives, such as no net loss or net gain. The evidence available to date points to somewhat mixed results in terms of the environmental effectiveness of existing biodiversity offset schemes. This is due not to the instrument itself, however, but rather to how these schemes have been designed and implemented in practice. The purpose of the article is to determine approaches and criteria for assessing the environmental effect of applying offset schemes for losses of ecosystems with special natural value when implementing economic development projects. The objectives of offset schemes are the conservation of biodiversity, ecosystems, their elements and ecosystem services. It is proposed to use the approach of assessing ecosystem assets when assessing the environmental result of the implementation of offset schemes for ecosystem losses: assessment of changes in ecosystem area; assessment of changes in the state of ecosystems. It is also noted that in order to objectively assess the environmental effect of implementing offset schemes, it is advisable to assess changes in two groups of ecosystems: changes in ecosystems with special environmental value that were destroyed in the territory of the economic project; changes in ecosystems in compensation areas. The result of the application of offset schemes is: 1) the preservation of ecosystems with special conservation value by “moving” it to the compensation site; 2) changes in ecosystems in the compensation area; 3) the total area of ecosystems is reduced by an amount equal to the area of the destroyed ecosystem with special environmental value within the territory of the economic development project; 4) the quality and viability of ecosystems reproduced by humans is significantly lower than those of destroyed natural ones. Considering that the result of implementation of offset schemes is the loss of the total area of ecosystems and the relatively low level of viability of the ecosystems reproduced in the compensation areas, the environmental effectiveness of such schemes is questionable.