Lab Sheet for Patient Earth

Introduction
Detailed Labsheets
Ecosystems
Planetary Health
Base Line
Syndrome
Diagnosis
Prognosis
Therapy
Indicators and Indexes
Biomass Distribution
Bioregion Health
Environmental Indicators
Indicators for the Humansphere
Basics of Indicators
User Access

Ecosystem Health

Assessing ecosystem health is a complex task that can be done from many different viewpoints and with many different traget audiences.

A recent assessment completed by Swiss Re takes a view on ecosystem services with the goal to inform the insurance industry about risks and potential future losses.


Figure 1: Ecosystem services identified based on re/insurance business relevance and data availability. From Swiss Re (2020).


Figure 2: Global SRI BES Index map at 1 km 2 resolution. From Swiss Re (2020a).


Table 1: G20 rankings for Swiss Re Institute BES. Locations with high values of the SRI BES Index (upper 15th percentile globally) are considered to be "intact" ecosystems with significant value for biodiversity and high capacity to provide ecosystem services. Locations with low BES values (lower 15th percentile globally) are considered to be "fragile" ecosystems that have suffered the effects of degradation. From Swiss Re (2020b).