Introduction: nature as a development asset

Economies are embedded in nature and depend on ecosystem services like pollination, water filtration, and climate regulation. This report provides evidence on nature’s importance to development and identifies win-win policy pathways. Nature underpins all 17 Sustainable Development Goals, yet ecosystems are deteriorating faster than they can replenish. Renewable natural capital accounts for 23 per cent of wealth in low-income countries. Global economic activity has increased sixfold since the 1970s. Approximately 44 trillion dollars of global value added — over half of global GDP — depends highly or moderately on ecosystem services.

Methods: linking nature and the economy for improved policy making

The report uses a novel integrated modelling framework combining a computable general equilibrium model with ecosystem models covering pollination, timber, fisheries, and carbon sequestration. High-resolution spatial data helps analyse global-to-local dynamics. The model compares a baseline scenario with “business-as-usual” (BAU) and “partial ecosystem collapse” scenarios. A key novelty is that land supply is endogenously determined by changing economic conditions. The Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs (InVEST) tool is used to map and value nature’s contributions to people.

Setting the scene: the business-as-usual scenario

Under BAU, the world is projected to lose 46 million hectares of natural land between 2021 and 2030, converted to managed forests, pastureland, and cropland. This impacts ecosystem services, resulting in a 2.8 per cent reduction in marine fisheries. Additionally, 791 million metric tonnes of carbon dioxide are projected to be emitted. This decline results in a loss of global real GDP in 2030 of 90 billion dollars to 225 billion dollars. Major losses occur in Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Brazil.

What happens when nature’s services collapse?

A partial collapse of services — wild pollination, marine fisheries, and tropical timber — could lead to a 2.3 per cent contraction in global GDP, or 2.7 trillion dollars annually by 2030. This equals a 10 per cent decline in 2021-2030 global GDP growth. Low-income countries stand to lose the most, with a 10 per cent drop in real GDP. Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia would experience the greatest relative contractions. Fifty-one countries, with a total population of 1.6 billion, are projected to experience GDP declines of 10 to 20 per cent.

Policy response and the political economy

Nature-smart policies can reduce collapse risks and create economic gains. Reforming agricultural subsidies by providing decoupled support based on land holdings decreases natural land loss by 8 per cent. Forest carbon payments can reduce loss by up to 35 per cent. When decoupled support is combined with agricultural R&D and global carbon payments, 50 per cent of natural land loss is avoided. These policies can increase global real GDP by up to 150 billion dollars in 2030. R&D investments benefit developing countries disproportionately, with 55 per cent of benefits accruing to China, India, and Nigeria.

Implications for the 30×30 global target

The “30×30” goal to protect 30 per cent of the planet by 2030 is achievable at a moderate cost. While pursuing this in isolation would entail a global GDP loss exceeding 200 billion dollars, combining it with nature-smart policies like subsidy decoupling and R&D investment reduces the net cost to 0.1 per cent of global GDP (115 billion dollars). When carbon sequestration benefits are considered, the net global cost is only 13 billion dollars. Developing countries account for 80 per cent of conservation efforts.

Conclusions and the way forward

Protecting nature makes clear economic sense as the cost of inaction is systemic. Nature-smart policies are also climate-smart, making economies more efficient. Economics should contribute to natural capital valuation and integrate ecosystem services into national accounting. Ambition requires tackling political economy challenges by ensuring gains are distributed fairly across social groups, overcoming potential resistance from landowners and other affected stakeholders.