Författare: John Hawkins Senior Lecturer Canberra School of Politics Eco

Climate regulation through carbon storage was worth A$43.2 billion to Australia in 2020-21, according to a report released today which seeks to put a monetary value on the benefits flowing from our natural assets.

Australia’s first national ecosystem accounts were released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics today. Together, they reveal the key ways our environment contributes to Australia’s economic and social wellbeing in dollar terms.

Ecosystems covered by the accounts include desert, grasslands, native forests, rivers, streams, coastal areas and oceans.

The accounts provide a holistic view of Australia’s land, freshwater and marine environments. They intend to help policymakers look beyond GDP to a broader measurement of how ecosystems contribute to society and the economy.

The accounts provide a holistic measure of Australia’s land, freshwater and marine environments.
junaidslife/Shutterstock

Valuing our ecosystems

The accounts cover services provided by Australia’s ecosystems in 2020–21.

Australian ecosystems stored more than 34.5 billion tonnes of carbon – the most valuable service by ecosystems examined in the accounts, according to the ABS.

It brought a $43.2 billion benefit to Australia in the form of climate regulation. Plants and other organisms reduce greenhouse gases in the atmosphere by removing and storing them. This helps stabilise the climate, avoiding damage caused by climate change.

Grasslands made the biggest contribution to carbon storage, followed by native forests and savannas.

The accounts show grazed biomass, or grasslands, provide $40.4 billion in benefits, through the forage provided to cattle and sheep. The dollar figure represents what farmers would otherwise have spent on feeding their livestock.

The accounts also examined the provision of surface water taken from ecosystems, and used for drinking, energy production, cooling, irrigation and manufacturing. This was valued at $1.4 billion.

The provision of wild fish, sold to consumers to eat, was put at $39.2 million.

The accounts also reveal how coral reefs, sandbanks, dunes and mangroves protect our coastlines against tides and storm surges.

The ABS estimates mangroves protected 4,006 dwellings around Australian coastlines. This prevented more than $57 million worth of building damage.

The accounts also track changes in Australia’s ecosystems.

Some 281,000 hectares of mostly farmland were converted to urban and industrial uses between 2015–16 and 2020–21. And 169,000 hectares of “steppe” land – flat, unforested grassland – was converted to sown pastures and fields.

Feral animal and weed species continue to spread. Meanwhile, the number of threatened native species is increasing.

Why do we need ecosystem accounting?

Think of a logged forest. The value of the timber produced counts towards Australia’s gross domestic product. But cutting trees down also produces a loss. For example, the forest is no longer there for the community to enjoy. And it no longer provides “services” such as filtering water and preventing soil erosion.

There are many reasons to measure the value of those services. For example, governments might then be able to charge a logging company a licence fee which reflects the community value of the forest. A government may decide the forest is too valuable to allow logging at all, or the fee may just be set too high for any company to find it profitable to log it.

To date, the value lost when trees are cut down, or other ecosystems are damaged, has not been included in the national accounts. The new environmental accounts seek to change this.

Obviously, ecosystems are complex and difficult to measure. The ABS has been guided by an international framework developed by the United Nations.

The ecosystem accounts are a collaboration between several federal agencies: the ABS, the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, and the CSIRO.

Cutting trees down produces a loss, as well as profits.
Bob Brown Foundation via AAP

Boundless plains and golden soil, girt by sea

The accounts distinguish between environmental “realms”.

About half of Australia’s terrestrial (dry land) realm is desert. About a quarter is savanna and grassland. Intensively used land, such as pastures, is a smaller proportion.

There are contrasts between the states. Western Australia has 158 million hectares of desert while Victoria, Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory have none. Queensland, Western Australia and the Northern Territory host 97% of Australia’s mangroves.

About half of Australia is the marine realm, covering 681 million hectares. Some 30% of this is the marine shelf and 70% deep sea. About 14 million hectares comprise coral reefs. The darker areas in the map below show where most fish are caught.

The coastal realm comprises mangroves and saltmarsh. In 2021, mangroves covered an estimated 1.1 million hectares of Australia’s coastal areas.

A small but important proportion of Australia is our freshwater realm, comprising rivers and streams. The accounts show between 2015–16 and 2020–21, 4% of natural environments along perennial rivers were converted to higher intensity land uses.

Where to now?

These accounts are just the first step in estimating the value of Australia’s natural assets.

The ABS will update Australia’s ecosystem accounts annually. It describes the inaugural accounts as “experimental” and says the government agencies involved will run a consultation process to improve them.

We can expect the accounts to become more useful over time as data accrues and trends can be identified.

According to the ABS, policy uses for the accounts include managing healthy and resilient ecosystems, and integrating biodiversity into planning.

Poet and playwright Oscar Wilde defined a cynic as someone who “knows the price of everything but the value of nothing”. In today’s society we often underrate things that do not have a dollar value attached.

So this compilation of Australia’s ecosystems, and their value to us, is a welcome development. It should lead to more informed, holistic decisions about whether natural assets should be protected, or damaged for economic benefit. Läs mer…

Peter Dutton and his Coalition colleagues have dithered for several weeks on their plans for the Commonwealth public sector.

While being upfront that public service jobs would be targeted, they’ve made numerous contradictory statements about the number of public servants who would be sacked if the Coalition wins the coming election.

But Peter Dutton’s most recent comments confirm that he clearly wants to make significant cuts.

And it’s hard to see how the sackings wouldn’t erode important front line services that many Australians depend on for help and support.

36,000 jobs on the line

This week the opposition leader declared the Coalition would achieve A$24 billion in savings by reducing the size of the public service.

He was unequivocal. The money would be clawed back over four years and would more than cover the Coalition’s promised $9 billion injection into Medicare.

Dutton explicitly tied the $24 billion in savings to the 36,000 Commonwealth public servants who have been hired since the last election

Under the Labor Party, there are 36,000 additional public servants, that’s at a cost of $6 billion a year, or $24 billion over the forward estimates. This program totals $9 billion over that period. So, we’ve well and truly identified the savings.

While still not nominating a precise number of job cuts, it’s Peter Dutton’s clearest statement of intent to date. By “truly” identifying the savings, 36,000 jobs are on the line. And it accords with Dutton’s earlier comments that the extra workers are not providing value for money for Australian taxpayers.

(They have) not improved the lives of Australians one iota

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton says front line services wont be affected by his plans to sack public servants.
Mick Tsikas/AAP

While this sounds like he wants to dismiss them all, senior colleagues are more circumspect.

According to Nationals leader David Littleproud, the number of job cuts has not yet been decided. Shadow Public Service Minister Jane Hume further muddied the waters by referring to the cuts being by attrition, and excluding frontline services.

Frontline services

The public service head count has grown to 185,343, as of June 2024. So cutting 36,000 staff, or even a large proportion of that number, would be a very significant reduction.

The agencies that added the most public servants between June 2023 and June 2024 were the National Disability Insurance Agency (up 2,193), Defence (up 1,425), Health and Aged Care (up 1,173) and Services Australia (up 1,149).

Many of these extra staff would be providing invaluable front line services to clients and customer who are accessing essential support.

And some of the new public servants replaced more expensive outsourced workers. Finance Minister Katy Gallagher has claimed the Albanese government has saved $4 billion of taxpayers’ money by reducing spending on consultants and contractors.

Rather than the alleged explosion in the size of the bureaucracy, the growth in public service numbers has closely matched the increase in the population. Last year, they accounted for 1.36% of all employed persons, up by only a minuscule degree on the 1.35% in 2016.

Canberra bashing

According to Dutton, the 36,000 additional public servants hired under Labor all work in Canberra. It was not a slip of the tongue. The claim is also in the Liberal Party’s pre-election pamphlet.

But only 37% of the public service workforce is located in the national capital. Half are based in state capitals. A full quarter of those involved in service delivery work in regional Australia.

The Liberals clearly think they have nothing to lose among Canberra voters, given they have no members or senators from the Australian Capital Territory.

Public Service Minister, Katy Gallagher says if 36,000 public servants are sacked, at least 23,000 would be from outside Canberra.
Mick Tsikas/AAP

The coming election will no doubt tell us if Canberra bashing still resonates with voters elsewhere in the country. Dutton has clearly made the political judgement that it does.

Another night of the long knives?

A change of government often precipitates a clean out at the top of the public service.

When the Howard government was elected in 1996, no fewer than six departmental secretaries were sacked on the infamous night of the long knives. Then prime minister Tony Abbott dismissed four departmental chiefs in one fell swoop after taking office in 2013. He didn’t even consult his treasurer before dumping the head of Treasury.

This pattern of culling senior public servants represents a chilling risk to good policy development. Departmental secretaries concerned about losing their jobs may be reluctant to give the “frank and fearless advice” their positions demand.

Read more:
After robodebt, here’s how Australia can have a truly ’frank and fearless’ public service again

Spending cuts after the election

Voters are entitled to know what the Coalition has planned for the public service before they cast their ballots.

The lack of detail on job losses is matched by a reluctance to outline spending cuts elsewhere. Dutton has ruled out an Abbott-style audit commission. He is prepared to cut “wasteful” spending, but won’t say if it may be necessary to also chop some worthwhile outlays to dampen inflationary pressures.

Dutton is adamant that any spending cuts by a government he leads will be determined after the election, not announced before it. This does nothing for democratic accountability. It does not give the electorate the chance to cast their votes on the basis of an alternative vision from the alternative government.

All Australians, not just public servants, deserve to know before polling day just how deep Dutton and the Coalition are really planning to cut. Läs mer…