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The ethics of offsetting natureIves, Christopher; Bekessy, Sarahhttps://researchrepository.rmit.edu.au/discovery/delivery/61RMIT_INST:ResearchRepository/12247906710001341?l#13248419480001341

Ives, & Bekessy, S. (2015). The ethics of offsetting nature. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment,13(10), 568–573. https://doi.org/10.1890/150021

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Ives, C and Bekessy, S 2015, 'The ethics of offsetting nature', Frontiers in Ecologyand the Environment, vol. 13, no. 10, pp. 568-573.

https://researchbank.rmit.edu.au/view/rmit:35521

Published Version

The Ecological Society of America

http://dx.doi.org/10.1890/150021

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www.frontiersinecology.org © The Ecological Society of America

The use of offsets to mitigate biodiversity losses hasproliferated in recent years. Most of the approxi-

mately 51 schemes operating around the world haveemerged over the past 10 years (Figure 1). Increasingly,more traditional systems for safeguarding biodiversity arebeing discarded in favor of options that “trade nature”.

Offsetting policies seek to compensate for biodiversitylosses at an impact site by generating ecological gainselsewhere (Maron et al. 2012). This increased flexibility isintended to facilitate both economic development andenvironmental protection, and is an appealing option todevelopers and policy makers. Yet there is fierce debateconcerning the validity of offsetting (Vidal 2014), withopinions divided among various stakeholders. Forinstance, in a recent online public consultation under-taken by the European Commission, there was an almost50/50 split between survey respondents who thought bio-

diversity offsetting was appropriate and those whothought otherwise (European Commission 2015).

Opinions are similarly divided in the scholarly litera-ture, with some heralding the potential positive gains forbiodiversity from offsetting (Bayon and Jenkins 2010) andothers expressing doubts (Walker et al. 2009). One area ofconcern is that offsetting results in poorer environmentaloutcomes for legal or political reasons. While biodiversityoffsetting is intended as a “last resort”, to be applied exclu-sively to residual impacts of a development project afterefforts have been made to avoid and minimize environ-mental harm (BBOP 2012), political and economic moti-vations regularly outweigh or undermine environmentalprotection (Gibbons and Lindenmayer 2007; Walker et al.2009; Gordon et al. 2015). From a scientific perspective,additional concerns include the (in)ability of biodiversityoffsets to achieve genuine compositional and functionalequivalence (Maron et al. 2012).

Some concerns, however, transcend scientific or tech-nical reasoning. They are ethical in nature and lie at theheart of the current debate. Many conservation scientistsand environmentalists disagree fundamentally with mar-ket-based conservation schemes such as biodiversity off-setting, believing that such approaches are incongruouswith nature’s intrinsic value (McCauley 2006). Yet theseethical concerns have often been conflated with com-ments about the technical design of these schemes. Forinstance, jurisdictions differ in their approaches to “in-kind” offsets (ie requiring trades to be of identical typeand location) versus “out-of-kind” offsets (ie permittingtrades between different kinds of ecological entities; Bullet al. 2013). These dimensions cannot be resolved on eco-logical grounds alone but relate to the underlying reasonswhy we want to conserve biodiversity. The same is truefor the mitigation hierarchy – the sequential procedure offirst avoiding and minimizing biodiversity impacts andrehabilitating damaged ecosystems, before offsetting the

CONCEPTS AND QUESTIONS

The ethics of offsetting nature Christopher D Ives†* and Sarah A Bekessy

Biodiversity offsetting is transforming conservation practice around the world. Development activities thatdegrade or destroy biodiversity at one location are now increasingly acceptable because of compensatoryenvironmental gains generated elsewhere. This change represents a major shift in how nature is protected,and yet its philosophical justification has received little attention. We argue that biodiversity offsetting alignsmost easily with a utilitarian ethic, where outcomes rather than actions are the focus. However, offsettingschemes often neglect to account for the multiple values that people assign to biodiversity – includingunique, place-based values. Furthermore, the implications of defining nature as a tradeable commodity mayaffect our sense of obligation to protect biodiversity. Ironically, offsetting may exacerbate environmentalharm because it erodes ethical barriers based on moral objections to the destruction of biodiversity. By failingto consider the ethical implications of biodiversity offsetting, we risk compromising the underlying motiva-tions for protecting nature.

Front Ecol Environ 2015; 13(10): 568–573, doi:10.1890/150021

School of Global, Urban and Social Studies, RMIT University,Melbourne, Australia; †current address: Faculty of Sustainability,Leuphana University, Lüneburg, Germany *([email protected])

In a nutshell:• Biodiversity offsetting schemes (those that enable biodiver-

sity losses to be compensated by gains elsewhere) haveincreased in number globally

• Many questions about the ethics of this approach to conser-vation are missing from the literature, yet these issues are atthe heart of public debate

• Biodiversity offsetting resonates most strongly with an “out-comes-based” form of nature conservation, rather than onefocused on regulating actions

• Current schemes do not adequately account for the multiplevalues that people assign to biodiversity

• Offsetting may decrease society’s sense of obligation to pro-tect biodiversity by framing biodiversity destruction as a tech-nical, economic problem rather than a moral and ethical one

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biodiversity impacts that remain (BBOP 2012). Withoutexploring the ethical implications of biodiversity offset-ting, scientists and policy makers risk evaluating its tech-nical feasibility rather than its justification according tothe reasons for conservation practice (Sagoff 2013).

Ethical questions that underpin the debate about biodi-versity offsetting are largely absent in both the academicliterature and public discourse (but see Spash [in press]).For example, if it is acceptable to offset residual impactsof a development project, why make any attempt to firstavoid or minimize unnecessary impacts if these too can beoffset without reducing net ecological outcomes? Can theprotection of organisms in one place compensate for thewillful destruction of others at another location? Is it nec-essary (or possible) to offset the reduction in human well-being associated with biodiversity loss? If nature is treatedas a tradeable commodity, does this remove an ethicalbarrier to its destruction? What does the buying and sell-ing of biodiversity credits say about our relationship tothe natural world? Here we argue that the legitimacy ofbiodiversity offsetting must be evaluated according tovarious ethical theories.

n Offsetting reflects a shift in conservation’s ethicalfoundations

The imperative to conserve biodiversity can be derivedfrom multiple ethical bases, yet these are rarely madeexplicit within legislation. Thus, the moral legitimacy ofa new legal mechanism for conservation needs to be scru-tinized according to different schools of ethical thought.

Ethics can be broadly represented by three differentapproaches: (1) consequentialist ethics (of which utilitar-ianism is the dominant form and will be considered here),

which focuses on the expected outcomes of actions; (2)deontological (or Kantian) ethics, which focuses on theactions themselves (with actions usually evaluatedaccording to a rule or rules); and (3) virtue ethics, whichemphasizes the virtues or moral character behind actions.There is great debate among ethicists concerning whichapproach is most robust and useful in different moral con-texts (Shafer-Landau 2013). With the rise of environ-mentalism, ethicists have looked to apply such traditionalapproaches to new environmental problems. This hasproven challenging because these approaches were devel-oped to help guide actions that are made by and thatinfluence humans. For these ethical approaches to informbehavior toward the environment, either an improvedrecognition of the connections between people andnature is required, or an expansion of moral responsibili-ties of humans toward the non-human realm is needed(Sarkar 2012).

Traditional biodiversity legislation has prohibited certainactions (eg clearing high-quality remnant vegetation orharming endangered species) according to clearly definedstatutes (eg the “taking” of endangered species under theUS Endangered Species Act; Ruhl 1999). Althoughderived from different ethical theories, the justification forlaw and policy might find the strongest support from adeontological framework. Deontological ethics can beeither agent-centered (focused on the person undertakingan action) or patient-centered (focused on the one beingacted upon). Thus, when applied to the environment, jus-tification for environmental laws comes from the moralconcept that either people should not harm biodiversity(agent-centered theory) or the integrity of the environ-ment should be upheld (patient-centered theory).Accordingly, the act of destroying biodiversity would have

Figure 1. Increase in offset schemes around the world. The pie chart presents a breakdown of these data by region. Of theapproximately 51 operational schemes (including compulsory and voluntary schemes and those under trial), most have emerged overthe past 10 years. Data were collated via a review of academic and gray literature and consultation with academic experts onbiodiversity offsetting.

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(and indeed has) been considered wrong and to be avoidedwhere possible, even under challenging circumstances. Inthis way, biodiversity legislation is analogous to laws gov-erning actions toward human beings. For instance, thecrime of assault represents a breaking of the law, irrespec-tive of any good the perpetrator may have performedbeforehand or that results afterwards.

Given that biodiversity offsetting emphasizes outcomesrather than the activities that harm biodiversity, thisapproach differs from traditional legislation that focuseson regulating the actions that cause environmentalimpacts. With biodiversity offsetting, there is no clearrule to break; one just has to find an appropriate biodiver-sity gain that can be traded in compensation for ecologi-cal losses. This appears to appeal to a utilitarian ethicaljustification, but this is not necessarily a problem.Utilitarian ethics is well-established and has been thedominant ethical system in the development of Westernliberal democracy and values. Classic utilitarianismassesses an action based on the expected good that willresult. This requires clear articulation of what constitutes“good” (eg desire satisfaction or preference fulfillment)and how it can be valued. This is a key challenge in phi-losophy but is particularly difficult in the context ofapplying utilitarian ethics to biodiversity offsetting fortwo reasons. First, scientifically defensible measurementsof biodiversity are needed to determine a unit of trade,and second, a robust method of determining the value ofa biodiversity unit is required.

n Measuring biodiversity

Determining a consistent, interchangeable unit of trade isespecially challenging for biodiversity because it is a com-plex, dynamic entity composed of multiple concepts suchas species richness and rarity, ecological complementarityand function, and genetic diversity (Purvis and Hector2000; Bull et al. 2013). Some biodiversity offsettingschemes focus on gains and losses in relation to a singleaspect of biodiversity (eg threatened species populationsor habitats), yet this approach can fail to adequately con-serve the broader ecosystem elements associated with aspecies or population. In many other cases, metrics oftrade are based on a biodiversity “score” (eg “habitathectares”; Parkes et al. 2003), which is used to trade bio-diversity “units” to achieve a predefined objective (eg netgain or no net loss). This method of ecological account-ing is of practical convenience since it allows patches ofhabitat to be traded, irrespective of ecological differences.However, by conflating the many attributes of biodiver-sity, this practice ignores the fact that “biodiversity can-not be reduced sensibly to a single number” (Purvis andHector 2000). Some schemes have addressed this issue byprohibiting trading between different ecosystem types(out-of-kind compensation), yet ecological equivalence isdifficult to achieve even with this restriction in place(Bull et al. 2013). Ultimately, defining a unit of trade is so

challenging because it is not an ecological question.Rather, it is connected to the underlying motivations forprotecting biodiversity, which are often difficult to articu-late (Miller et al. 2011).

The very presence of the mitigation hierarchy highlightsa lack of confidence in the ability of current assessmentmethods to measure biodiversity adequately and capture itsimportance. Proponents of biodiversity offsetting arguethat it should only be applied to residual or “unavoidable”impacts from a development project. Yet to date, there hasbeen no clear ethical explanation for why offsetting shouldfunction only as a “last resort” within the mitigation hier-archy. If (1) scientific measurements of biodiversity areequated with their importance, (2) biodiversity is mea-sured accurately, and (3) measured losses are adequatelycompensated for, then the requirement to first avoid andminimize impacts or restore biodiversity onsite mightappear unnecessary. The absence of a transparent, logicalbasis for the mitigation hierarchy is leading to a slackeningof the requirements, particularly when the economic costsof avoiding or minimizing impacts to biodiversity far out-weigh those related to offsetting. Permitting offsettingwithout reference to ethical reasons why it should be usedto compensate for unavoidable impacts alone is resulting inoffset gains being used to justify impacts that previouslywould not have been acceptable.

Uneasiness about the ability of existing metrics tomeasure the importance of biodiversity appropriately isalso revealed through legal stipulations about whattypes of impacts (or ecological entities) can or cannotbe offset. Many jurisdictions prevent offsetting ofimpacts to threatened species or habitats. In this way,these offset policies are something of a hybrid of utili-tarian ethics (they permit biodiversity impacts yetmaintain environmental “values” through compensa-tion) and deontological ethics (certain types of biodi-versity are off-limits). Again, a lack of philosophicalclarity has led to a gradual shift between these twostances over time as restrictions are removed. InAustralia, a leading jurisdiction in the implementationof offsets, the practice of trading biodiversity was ini-tially highly conservative. Offsetting was applicableonly for impacts on common vegetation types, requir-ing improvements in equivalent communities (like-for-like offsetting) (Victorian Government 2002). Afterincreasing pressure from industry, out-of-kind offsets (iegains in a different community type) were permitted,along with offsetting of listed threatened species, eventhose that are critically endangered. Today, biodiversityoffset credits in some parts of Australia can be pur-chased “over the counter” and can comprise entirelydisparate entities. For example, the impacts of a portdevelopment on endangered dugongs (Dugong dugon)have been offset (in part) by signage to encouragerecreational boat users to decrease their speed to reducethe likelihood or severity of boat strikes (Figure 2;Gladstone Ports Corporation 2012).


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n Scientific equivalence is not value equivalence

Even if it were possible to determine a consistent unit toevaluate ecological equivalence between biodiversityimpacts and biodiversity offsets, this still would not be asufficient utilitarian ethical justification of biodiversityoffsetting. According to utilitarian ethics, for an outcometo be morally valid, it is not the scientific equivalencethat matters, but value equivalence. This would requireconsideration of which values are relevant, and whose val-ues should be taken into account.

People assign a range of use and non-use values tonature, including subsistence, economic, aesthetic, thera-peutic, and bequest value (UNEP 2005). Thus, manypeople may object to offset agreements not only becausedifferent biodiversity features are incomparable scientifi-cally but also because the offsets and losses are not per-ceived to have the same value. Moreover, the values ofecosystems that commonly matter most to people – suchas aesthetic beauty, cultural importance, opportunities forsocial interaction, or existence value (simply knowing itis there) – are intangible and difficult to quantify (Kenteret al. 2015). These values are rarely, if ever, accounted forin biodiversity offsetting and may require qualitativerather than quantitative techniques for adequate assess-ment. Of course, if one considers nature to possess intrin-sic value (that is, its value is independent of a valuer; seeVucetich et al. 2015), then biodiversity offsetting may beimpractical because intrinsic values cannot be measured,prioritized, or traded off (Justus et al. 2009). In some ways,the challenge of capturing the values of biodiversity is anexpression of the cost–benefit analysis quandary in envi-ronmental management, whereby the aggregation of indi-vidual stated preferences according to utilitarian eco-nomic theory does not result in ultimately desirable andjust public outcomes (see, for example, Sagoff 2008).

Biodiversity offsetting has been compared to carbonoffsetting – an approach that, while contentious, is con-sidered by many scholars to be the most efficient way ofcurbing atmospheric carbon emissions. However, biodi-versity is quite unlike carbon. Trading metric tons of car-bon is simple ethically because carbon molecules gener-ally do not matter to people. The value that is assigned tocarbon is representative of its influence on other thingsthat are valued, such as human life, ecological outcomes,and economic systems. Applying a market mechanism tobiodiversity is much more ethically complex because bio-diversity itself is valued by people and because values asso-ciated with biodiversity typically pertain to specificspecies, habitats, and ecosystems.

Another key consideration, according to utilitarianethics, is whose values are considered in a decision. Usingecological features alone to calculate numerical scores forhabitat patches assumes that biodiversity is valuedequally everywhere by everyone. Of course, this assump-tion is inappropriate, given that different people willassign greater or lesser value to biodiversity for many rea-sons beyond its ecological condition or composition.Indeed, people’s attachment to specific places is oftenvery strong (Low and Altman 1992) and is related tounique meanings that certainly cannot be traded betweendifferent locations. Consider the offsetting of biodiversitylosses on the fringes of urban settlements arising from

Figure 2. Impacts to dugongs (a) from a port development inGladstone Harbour, Australia, have been offset using out-of-kind gains. The scale of the impacts to the system is clear whencomparing photographs from before (b) and after (c) thedevelopment.

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new housing developments (Bekessy et al. 2010).Creating offset sites away from where the biodiversity isbeing destroyed means that nature-based recreation andenvironmental education opportunities are lost, naturalamenities and environmental health are reduced, andplaces that shaped unique memories are markedly trans-formed (Figure 3). It is therefore unlikely that the offsetsites will be valued in the same way or to the same degreeas the original biodiversity located close to where peoplelive. Furthermore, while the economic and social gainsresulting from development projects may appear verylarge, they are typically concentrated to a small numberof people. In contrast, the instrumental values of naturalecosystems are typically diffuse yet benefit many(Rolston 1988).

Is it possible to adequately account for the range of val-ues that are associated with biodiversity in order for off-setting to be ethically viable? While recent progress hasbeen made in ecosystem services research along theselines (Daniel et al. 2012; Jax et al. 2013), assessing thediversity of values that people relate to biodiversityremains a daunting task and currently no biodiversity off-setting scheme comes close to doing so.

n Offsetting may undermine environmental virtues

Allowing for the buying and selling of nature may coun-teract the development of respectful, positive societalattitudes toward nature: the motivation for conserva-tion according to a virtue ethics framework. Hursthouse(2007) noted that environmentalists routinely identifytraditional vices, such as greed and self-indulgence, as

underpinning environmental prob-lems. She argued for a new “virtue” –respect for nature – which, if pursued,could help prevent environmentaldegradation, including biodiversityloss. While offsetting might make iteconomically less viable to destroybiodiversity, it rests on the assump-tion that there is nothing wrong perse with the manipulation and tradingof nature, and may therefore under-mine such a virtue. This danger ishighlighted by Goodin (1994), whodrew a comparison between the mon-etization of nature and the selling of“indulgences” by Catholic clergy inthe Middle Ages, whereby monetarypayment was given in remittance forsinful living.

A utilitarian ethic for environmen-tal protection may actually exacerbateenvironmental harm. In their study ofchildcare centers in Israel, Gneezy andRustichini (2000) showed that theintroduction of late pick-up fees

resulted in more parents arriving late to collect their chil-dren: a trend that persisted even when the fee was abol-ished. Commodification of the “late pick-up service”changed the ethical basis for punctuality from a respectfor the teacher to a market based on a willingness to payfor a service. In the same way, offsetting schemes may beless effective at preventing the loss of biodiversitybecause there can be no “guilt” attached to the act of buy-ing a commodity at will (Gneezy and Rustichini 2000).

n Conclusion

Biodiversity offsetting has flourished recently but repre-sents an ethical approach to protecting nature differentfrom that of traditional conservation legislation. Insteadof permitting or restricting actions, offsetting is based onmaintaining overall ecological value. Even if one doesnot object fundamentally to the trading of nature, offset-ting policies remain problematic because they do notmeasure the range of values that people associate withbiodiversity. Ironically, offsetting may exacerbate envi-ronmental harm because it removes an important ethicalroadblock to its destruction. It is critical therefore to con-sider the ethical implications of this change. Indeed, off-setting raises broader questions about how we shouldmeasure impacts to biodiversity, the level of impact weare willing to accept, and what motivates our desire toavoid such impacts. Thus, rather than accepting theinevitable rise of biodiversity offsetting, perhaps it is timeto reassess conservation’s ethical foundations to ensurethat the systems designed to conserve biodiversity areprotecting what really matters.

Figure 3. A residential development site in northern Melbourne, Australia, wherebyimpacts to the grassland ecosystem were offset elsewhere. Installations of metal wildlife-themed statues as part of an interpretive walk only serve to highlight the loss ofbiodiversity from the area.

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n Acknowledgements

CDI and SAB thank M Colyvan for insights and helpfulcomments on an earlier draft of this manuscript. M Hardyassisted with background research on global offsetschemes. J Bull, A Gordon, D Keith, and M Maronhelped in collating data for Figure 1. The graphic inFigure 1 was designed by TBJ Creative. SAB is supportedby an Australian Research Council (ARC) FutureFellowship. This research was conducted with fundingfrom the ARC Centre of Excellence for EnvironmentalDecisions and the Australian Government’s NationalEnvironmental Science Programme.

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