A new research initiative led by Sustainable Prosperity in partnership with the Forests Product Association of Canada, aims to explore links between economic productivity and natural capital. The project’s starting hypothesis is that economic and environmental prosperity are linked, it aims to shed further light on that link, while also aiming to propose good policies that enable the relationship to prosper.

The project is backed up by currently available data that suggests that Canada’s forestry sector productivity concurrent with improved environmental performance.

A key part of the research is grappling with the issue of natural capital, how to measure it and how to effectively take account of its value in today’s economy. Developing new forms of accounting or measurement are probably beyond the scope of this project, there are others tackling that challenge, but it set outs to provide the rationale for integrating towards an adjusted measure of economic productivity, which takes environmental factors into account.

Designing out negative externalities and rebuilding natural capital is also a key principle of the circular economy model, which has gained traction, in part because of the growing desire for a more wholesome global economic system.

Source: Linking Natural Capital and Productivity

Lead image licensed under CC – credit Flickr user: Richard Bracey

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