Testimony of William C. Clark

before the Committee on Science

United States House of Representatives

September 24, 2002

INTRODUCTION

Mr. Chairman and distinguished members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before this committee to discuss The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems: Measuring the Lands, Waters, and Living Resources of the United States, which was released earlier today.

My name is William Clark. I am the Harvey Brooks Professor of International Science, Public Policy and Human Development at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. I am testifying today on behalf of the H. John Heinz III Center for Science, Economics and the Environment, where I have, for nearly five years, served as chair of the committee overseeing the development of The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems. I am also a member of the group of senior advisors for the project and a member of the Center’s Board of Trustees.

PART I: THE STATE OF THE NATION’S ECOSYSTEMS PROJECT

A. Brief Summary of The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems Project

Policy makers and the public rely on a small, familiar set of indicators, such as interest rates, unemployment, inflation, the Dow Jones index, and GDP, to gauge the performance of the national economy. Despite their known shortcomings, these indicators describe important attributes and trends in the economy. Rational policy debate on the nation’s economy is promoted by a broad consensus regarding the importance of such fundamental indicators, and by a justified faith that the collection and reporting of data about their performance is not subject to distortions by narrow interests or political expediency.

Such is not the case with reporting on the state of the nation’s lands, waters, and living resources.

The Heinz Center’s State of the Nation’s Ecosystems report lays out a blueprint for periodic reporting on the condition and use of ecosystems in the United States. It was developed by experts from businesses, environmental organizations, universities, and federal, state, and local government agencies. It is designed to provide policymakers and the general public with a succinct and comprehensive—yet scientifically sound and nonpartisan— view of “how we are doing.”

The report identifies the major characteristics of ecosystems that should be tracked through time to provide such a comprehensive perspective. Where data of adequate quality are available, it also provides information on both current conditions and historic trends. The report also highlights key gaps—situations where reliable data do not exist or have not been assembled to support national reporting. Separate chapters in the report address coasts and oceans, farmlands, forests, fresh waters, grasslands and shrublands, and urban and suburban areas. These ecosystem-specific indicators are complemented by “core national indicators” that provide a highly aggregated view of overall conditions.

The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems provides a prescription for “taking the pulse” of America’s lands and waters. It identifies what should be measured, counted, and reported so that decision makers and the public can understand the changes that are occurring in the American landscape.

B. Project Background and Rationale

Most immediately, this project arose out of a federal interagency review of environmental monitoring and research programs, undertaken in the mid-1990s.[1] This effort, coordinated by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, identified the need to communicate consistent, accessible information about the condition and use of ecosystems to support decision making and to inform the public. This review recognized the substantial existing federal investment in environmental monitoring, reporting, and research[2]. However, the review also implicitly acknowledged that the independent nature of these programs, and of the complementary efforts undertaken by state and local governments, universities and the research community, and the private for- and non-profit sector, meant that the results were not communicated in an integrated fashion, accessible to those in policy making roles or to the public.

In a larger sense, however, the project arose out of a recognition that environmental protection and natural resource management and conservation are central elements of the political and economic landscape in the United States as we enter the 21^st century, and should be supported by a base of information that is consistent with their importance[3].

This recognition is not new. In 1970, the Council on Environmental Quality noted in its first annual report to Congress that the efforts of that time did “not provide the type of information or coverage necessary to evaluate the condition of the Nation's environment or to chart changes in its quality and trace their causes.”[4] Since then, many studies and many organizations, including the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Public Administration, have recognized this need.[5]

But despite some excellent syntheses of data on specific problems and places, there is no periodic, comprehensive, and reliable compilation of essential information about the overall state of the nation’s environment.[6] As a result, policymakers and other stakeholders are swamped by increasing volumes of data that nonetheless seem to neglect important issues or fail to provide a “big picture” view of what changes are occurring. Society all too often ends up arguing not about the issues, but about the relevance and validity of the data on which substantive policy debate depend.

For a nation deeply committed to protecting the environment, this is an unacceptable state of affairs. It is as though we would seek to develop sound economic policy without having reliable measures of the nation’s GDP, unemployment, or inflation rate, relying instead on idiosyncratic reports from individual firms, sectors, unions, and local chambers of commerce. We cannot know whether our current environmental policies and practices are sound, and we cannot make new policy with confidence, without a similar set of generally accepted measures of fundamental properties of the environment.

C. The Strategy: Using Past Attempts as a Guide

Based on the conclusions of the interagency review described above, in late 1996 OSTP asked The Heinz Center to create a nonpartisan, scientifically grounded report on the state of the nation’s ecosystems[7].

In undertaking this effort, The Heinz Center looked carefully at past efforts to report on the environment as well as other substantive areas, with an eye to identifying the reasons those efforts did not stand the test of time. Based on this analysis, the Center and its collaborators were guided by a fundamental conviction that, to be useful, The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems must

· Be scientifically credible. Too many earlier efforts were disregarded because they were perceived as willing to accept any data available, or because their conclusions were not based in sound science. We believed that the report’s content must benefit from input and review from a wide range of scientific and technical experts.

· Be nonpartisan, both in content and in process. Too many previous reporting efforts failed because they were perceived to be politicized or because they seemed to promote the perspectives of particular interests. Any hope for greater success requires that this effort be seen as fair and unbiased by a broad cross section of political interests.

· Engage the expertise and experience of the nation’s environmental monitoring programs and professionals. Any attempt to characterize the state of the nation’s ecosystems will fail without the cooperation of those who are engaged full time in the exacting and important profession of ecosystem monitoring and reporting.

· Benefit from experimentation and learning. No effort as ambitious as this could be expected to get everything right the first time around. Any hope for success depends on the ability to learn from the inevitable mistakes and to incorporate new data and understanding as they become available.

D. The Heinz Center’s Four-Sector Approach: A Critical Element of Project Success

A fundamental element of the Heinz Center’s operating philosophy is that sound solutions to environmental policy challenges must be developed with active input from environmental organizations, business, academic practitioners, and government representatives. This project is no different. For it, the Center developed a funding strategy that depended upon joint support from government, industry, and private foundations. It assembled a small in-house staff and a large team of part-time collaborators drawn from government, the private sector, environmental organizations, and academia. A set of interlocking committees, eventually involving nearly 150 individuals from nearly 100 institutions, and coordinated by a small staff at the Center, was responsible for the content of The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems. A group of senior advisors and the Center’s own Board of Trustees reviewed the project’s strategic directions, with special attention to ensuring broad and balanced representation. (All members of the various committees are listed in the report as well as on the Heinz Center’s web site, www.heinzctr.org/ecosystems[8].) Many more individuals and institutions were involved as contributors, advisors , and peer reviewers (peer reviewers are also listed on the website).

The funding portfolio for this project, like membership on the expert panels, was diverse. Nine federal agencies (the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Defense, the Department of Energy, the Department of the Interior, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the National Science Foundation; The Office of Naval Research provided grants administration support.), six corporate funders, including four Fortune-500 companies (Chevron Company, John Deere & Company, Georgia-Pacific Corporation, Procter & Gamble Company, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines, and Electric Power Research Institute), and seven foundations (Cleveland Foundation Special Fund No. 6, the Foundation for Environmental Research, the Vira I. Heinz Endowments, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Richard King Mellon Foundation, the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation) provided the support necessary to complete this report.

As is clear from the diversity of committee members and funding entities, no single group dominated the selection of indicators or presentation of data. For this reason, the results of this report are demonstrably non-partisan and independent of control by any single dominant political perspective.

E. Project Goals and Design Principles

At the outset, project participants identified a set of goals and basic design elements that should shape a successful report. Such a report should

· present a succinct set of indicators. A successful report should identify a limited number of very important characteristics of ecosystems, which should be tracked and reported through time.

· be targeted at decision-makers and opinion leaders. It should non-technical language, but remain faithful to its scientific and technical foundations.

· provide data where possible, but also identify key information gaps. Rather than using data simply because they are available, we sought to identify those indicators that should be reported, identify and report data where they are available, and highlight those instances in which data are not adequate.

· describe conditions, but leaves to others judgments about whether they are “good” or “bad” or recommending policies or actions. We sought to provide objective information that others can, and hopefully will, use as they debate natural resource and environmental policies. We explicitly sought not to become embroiled in the substance of those debates.

· report on the state or condition of ecosystems, not on pollution or other stresses, or on government or private programs or actions. Our efforts focus on the resources people care most about, and complement the many reports already available on emissions and activities.

report on both ecosystem condition and the goods and services that people derive from the system. People care about ecosystems for many reasons, and the suite of indicators reflects a wide variety of perspectives on what is important about ecosystems.

We believe the report released today is faithful to these aims.

F. Ecosystem Reporting: What Does the Report Present?

The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems provides indicators of the use and condition of America’s coasts and oceans, farmlands, forests, fresh waters, grasslands and shrublands, urban and suburban areas, and the nation as a whole.

In order to avoid reporting on radically different aspects of different ecosystems, we identified ten key characteristics of ecosystems that should be reported for any ecosystem. These are identified in Table 1, along with brief statements of their significance.

For each major ecosystem type (e.g., farmlands, forests, etc.) these ten characteristics are described by 14-18 indicators. There are ten “core national indicators” that describe these characteristics for the nation as a whole. Thus, the report presents 103 indicators in all.

Table 1

Ecosystem Characteristic	What Do The Indicators Measure—and Why Are They Important?
System Dimensions
Extent	How much area does an ecosystem or land cover type occupy? The area of an ecosystem is its most basic characteristic – increases or decreases mean gains or losses of all the goods and services associated with that system.
Fragmentation and Landscape Pattern	What are the shapes and sizes of patches of an ecosystem type, and how are they intermingled with one another? These characteristics can greatly influence the goods and services an area provides, such as wildlife habitat, filtering sediments from runoff, and providing solitude.
Chemical and Physical Conditions
Nutrients, Carbon, Oxygen	How much nitrogen, phosphorus, oxygen and carbon are found in different systems? Nitrogen and phosphorus are key plant nutrients, but in excess can cause water quality problems. Carbon storage in ecosystems is a key consideration in global warming discussions, and oxygen in rivers, lakes, and coastal waters is needed for fish and other animals to survive.
Chemical Contaminants	How many synthetic compounds and heavy metals are found in ecosystems, and how often do these compounds exceed regulatory or advisory thresholds? (For urban / suburban areas, we also include air pollution from ozone in this category.) Chemical contaminants can harm people and damage ecosystems through their effects on plants and animals.
Physical Conditions	What is the condition of key aspects of the physical makeup of an ecosystem, such as the temperature of the water or the amount of salt in the soil? Plants and animals are adapted to certain physical conditions and can be harmed by changes in these conditions.
Biological Components
Plants and Animals	What is the status of native and non-native plant and animal species? People care deeply about wildlife, and the condition of plants and animals can reflect broader ecosystem conditions. Non -native species can disrupt ecosystems and cause economic damage.
Biological Communities	What is the condition of the plant and animal communities that make up an ecosystem? Interacting biological communities form the “biological neighborhood” within which individual species exist.
Ecological Productivity	What are the trends in plant growth on land and in the water? Changes in the amount of plant growth may signal important changes in overall ecosystem condition.
Human Use
Food, Fiber, and Water	How is the amount and quality of key ecosystem products changing over time? Ecosystems produce goods that meet a variety of important human needs and that are important to the national economy.
Other Services, Including Recreation	How often do people take part in outdoor recreation activities, and what other services, such as soil building and flood protection, are provided by natural ecosystems? Though less tangible, these other services are also important both to people and to the ecosystems themselves.

G. Plans for the Future: Making Environmental Reporting

An Institution In Our Society

The Heinz Center’s overarching goal is to establish The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems as a long-running series, with new editions due every five years. These editions will incorporate continuous improvements in understanding of ecological functioning, technology for monitoring, and indicator design. The web version, at www.heinzctr.org/ecosystems, will be updated annually to incorporate newly available data.

The Heinz Center is committed to producing the second volume in this series, and to ensuring that institutional and financial arrangements are put in place to enable the production of future editions. We are currently seeking financial support for these activities.

We envision significant work in three areas, outlined below. In addition, the first step, following release of the report, will be to undertake a serious effort to listen to feedback from readers concerning what worked and didn’t work in the report and what changes would make it more accessible and more useful. We are committed to such listening as an essential element to ensuring the report’s relevance and utility over time.

The three substantive areas on which The Heinz Center plans to focus are:

1. Planning to fill data gaps. The report identifies a significant number of instances in which data for reporting on key ecosystem characteristics are not presently available. In some cases, these data are collected, but not aggregated in a manner that is amenable to national reporting, while in others the required monitoring is not being done. The report includes preliminary information on filling these gaps, but additional analysis is required to determine which gaps are easiest—financially and technically—to fill, as well as which are “most important” to address. Combining financial and technical practicality with judgments as to the relative importance of filling different gaps will provide a concrete roadmap to guide future investment.

2. Continuously improving the indicators. The framework for reporting and the indicators selected for inclusion in The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems are sound. As with any complex undertaking, however, there are possibilities for refinement, increased consistency between indicators, and other substantive improvements. Based on internal assessments and feedback from readers, The Heinz Center will undertake a series of targeted efforts to improve the consistency of sets of similar indicators in different ecosystems, to address potential statistical and technical issues in selected individual indicators, and to catalyze discussions within the relevant technical communities where indicator definitions are unclear.

3. Providing a stable future. To be successful, The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems must be produced in an environment that is free from perceptions of political influence and characterized by a transparency in its activities and engagement of a wide variety of interests in its governance. The Heinz Center will foster a high-level dialogue on the institutional and financial arrangements that can provide this environment, including consideration of both in-government and non-governmental arrangements.

PART II: FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS FROM

tHE STATEOF THE NATION’S ECOSYSTEMS

In this portion of my testimony, I will respond to the specific questions posed by the Committee Chairman in his letter of invitation, and provide additional information on the project’s findings.

A. What Is the State of Our Ability to Report on “the State of the Nation’s Ecosystems”?

As noted above, our effort defined 10 basic reporting categories, and 103 specific indicators, needed to fully characterize the state of the nation’s ecosystems at a level appropriate for informing policy discussion. We were able to identify all the data required for national reporting for 33 of these indicators. For an additional 25 indicators, we believe that the data that are available, although limited, provide the rudiments of a national reporting perspective. Thus, for slightly over half the indicators we selected, we were able to locate, and include in the report, some or all of the necessary data.

For nearly a third of the indicators, we could not locate data that were adequate for national reporting. In some case, the required data may be collected, but have not been aggregated or otherwise merged to support national reporting. (In some cases, as with data that may be collected by multiple states or research institutions, there may be significant differences in methodology that may—or may not—preclude such aggregation.) In other cases, as with many remote sensing-based indicators, the required data have been collected, but not analyzed or prepared for national reporting. In yet other cases, the required data simply are not collected on any widespread basis.

For about 14% of the indicators, our technical committees were not able to define an indicator in sufficient detail to enable a determination of data availability. These instances represent a challenge to the technical community to identify more specifically what should be measured to report on key characteristics.

B. What Does The Report Conclude About The State Of The Nation’s Ecosystems?

The main conclusion of the report is that it is possible to report the state of an ecosystem in an unbiased manner by describing ten general ecosystem characteristics. While nearly half of the indicators that describe these characteristics currently lack nationally-representative data, we have established an invaluable roadmap for fully characterizing our nation’s ecosystems—a roadmap that will have enduring value to our society and our environment.

The guiding principles behind this report specifically preclude our making broad, conclusive statements such as “the state of our nation’s ecosystems has never been stronger (or weaker).” While we hope that others will use the indicators we have selected and reported on to make such statements, they inevitably involve value judgments: “more of X is good; more of Y is bad,” which are inappropriate for an independent statistical reporting effort. Yet, such an effort is essential to provide a focus of debate over policy and legislation. We have gone to great lengths to make sure that the status of our nation’s ecosystems is reported in an objective manner so that the findings will be accepted by all sectors of society.

Each indicator reports a story in and of itself, and the stories of 14-18 indicators are woven together to describe the status of any particular ecosystem. Unfortunately, there exist major gaps in our ability to report fully on the state of the nation’s ecosystems—just less than 50% of the indicators identified by our process lack nationally-representative data sources, or have not yet been fully defined. However, the current report is rich with information on the state of the nation’s ecosystems. There are a variety of summary sections throughout the report that distill the information presented in 103 indicators across six ecosystem types. It is these summaries that tell the stories of our ecosystems. These stories will become the uncontested common ground in debates about the environment.

Finally, for any particular indicator, its value for any given year means little taken out-of-context. We do not evaluate the rate of unemployment in a vacuum—instead, we have established a record of more than fifty years of reporting on unemployment rates; any quarter’s rate can be compared easily and objectively to past trends. A similar approach is required for making judgements about any single ecological indicator, and for that matter, the composite state of our nation's ecosystems. For example, knowing that a particular ecosystem occupied 500 million acres in 1992 is not particularly enlightening, but knowing that this value is 10% larger or smaller than it was in 1982 would be quite interesting, and perhaps to some, alarming. Or, knowing what fraction of streams had different concentrations of nitrate might not be all that interesting in itself, but being able to compare these concentrations with the levels deemed safe for the protection of human health would provide important context and make the concentration data easier to interpret. For forty-two of the 103 indicators, we present trend information, comparisons with widely accepted standards, or similar contextual information.

C. What Are The Major Gaps In Existing Data And Knowledge, And How Should They Be Filled?

Unfortunately, with nearly half of the indicators having inadequate data for national reporting, selecting a few as the most important is difficult. Data gaps were found in all ecosystem types and indicator categories.

Clearly, urban/suburban areas, and grasslands/shrublands have the fewest indicators for which adequate data for national reporting are available. Forest ecosystems, by contrast, have a higher percentage of indicators with good data.

Indicator categories with the poorest data availability are those dealing with biological communities, landscape patterns, and the services, including recreation, provided by ecosystems. In addition, there are several categories for which trend data are limited, making interpretation of current conditions difficult. These include: nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus), chemical contaminants, plant and animal species, and biological communities. For these categories of indicators, trend data are available for only 20% or fewer of the indicators.

Filling these data gaps will be the responsibility of a range of federal, state, local, and private entities. The report contains a preliminary assessment of what would be needed to fill these gaps, but more work is needed to both flesh out exactly what should be done, and decisions must be made as to, for example, data should be collected using existing federal programs, federal-state cooperative ventures, or other means. Exploring these questions is high on the Heinz Center’s agenda for producing the next volume of the report in five years (see the discussion above on Plans for the Future). Ultimately, however, the debate on what kind of system America should have for monitoring and reporting on its ecosystems will almost certainly need to involve the Congress, the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the National Academy of Sciences, and a number of private and state government organizations.

D. Why Is It Important To Have Information About Ecosystems On A National Level?

Information about ecosystems is valuable on a variety of scales, including local, state, regional, or national. Similarly, decisions about the stewardship, management, or use of ecosystems are made at all of these levels. Even though there is a trend toward encouraging local decision making about natural resource issues, numerous decisions are still made, and will remain to be made, at the national level. Congress appropriates funds, enacts authorizing statutes, and conducts oversight over federal agency activities. Federal agencies adopt broad policies and allocate funding. Advocacy organizations representing both conservation and development perspectives work hard to influence these decisions, both directly and through shaping public opinion. In such cases, information about overall conditions, relative changes in different areas, and emerging trends is extremely useful.

Decision makers at the state, regional, and local level can also benefit from a general understanding that is provided by this report’s suite of indicators. Even though they may not find details of their area represented in the nationally-representative indicators, this report will allow them to make their decisions in the context of the national picture. For example, local land-use planners can use information on changes in specific ecosystem types to help shape local policies concerning what areas can be developed and preserved, and local forest managers can compare the rates at which insects and disease are affecting their area with national trends.

E. What Are The Policy And Scientific Implications Of The Report?

There are two kinds of policy implications raised by this report. The first involves the reporting process itself, while the second type relates to the use, management, and conservation of the resources described by this report.

Implications for ecosystem reporting: This report is built on a number of ongoing monitoring and reporting programs without which even the incomplete picture we present would have been impossible to assemble. If the nation wishes to retain its present capacity for knowing about the state of its ecosystems, these programs must be sustained. The report also identified a significant number of data and knowledge gaps—gaps that prevent full and comprehensive reporting on the state of the nation’s ecosystems. If we as a nation wish to better inform ourselves on this critical dimension, we must address several key questions. These include which data gaps should be filled first and who should fill them, and, in the longer term, what institutional mechanisms should be put in place to ensure continued high-quality, objective, non-partisan, and transparent reporting on the state of the nation’s ecosystems. As noted above, the Heinz Center plans to provide input to both of these critical decisions (see the section on “Plans for the Future”).

Implications for resource management: Individual indicators in this report may play important roles in decisions about the use and management of specific resources. For example, the data we present illustrate that nitrate, which is an important plant nutrient, but which in excess can contribute to water quality degradation, enters streams in greater amounts in certain areas of the country (the Northeast and upper Midwest) and in areas dominated by certain land uses (agriculture). Such a finding clearly has important implications for addressing water quality issues. Another example: the data we present show that the number of cases of waterborne disease attributed to drinking water has declined over the past several decades, while the number associated with contact recreation has increased. Such a finding clearly has implications for public health and environmental programs.

Each of our indicators was chosen precisely because it would be relevant to policy debates. If the age structure of forests changed dramatically, if the number of streams with zero flow for some part of the year increased or decreased dramatically, if the area of croplands affected by high soil salinity changed—in each case, these findings would have important implications for those who own, manage, or otherwise care deeply about those resources.

Scientific implications: The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems poses several challenges to the scientific community. In the shortest run, there may be technical challenges in collecting or summarizing the data nationally. The Center and other groups need to work over the coming months and years to better define costs and priorities for filling the data gaps identified in the report.

Looking a bit further, we have identified a number of indicators for which additional scientific or technical work is needed to clearly specify what should be measured or reported to adequately characterize a specific ecosystem characteristic. For example, we did not identify exactly what should be reported to accurately capture what is commonly referred to as “sprawl” – a pattern of land use change in the area where areas that are clearly suburban and those that are clearly rural grade into each other. There are many approaches to this challenge, none of which has, yet, become the consensus choice among expert practitioners.

There are, of course, constant challenges in any evolving system: can we develop a better means of capturing important changes in the environment. These challenges will be with us for the duration of our efforts to report on the state of the nation’s ecosystems, and will be manifested as periodic, although generally minor, adjustments to the suite of indicators.

Other questions arise in the longer term context as well: How do indicators at the national scale relate to indicators at local and regional scales? Can we create a system that reports on conditions at multiple geographic scales, tailoring indicators as appropriate, but sill having some overall coherence, so that one can talk about conditions at the local level in the same “language” as one talks about conditions at the local scale?

Finally, there are scientific challenges in the area of interpretation and assessment. How do multiple indicators “fit together” to provide an integrated view of an ecosystem or area? Can we resolve scientific uncertainties about the linkages between observed conditions (provided by our indicators) and stressors in the environment?

PART III CONCLUDING REMARKS

This document responds to a clearly defined need—periodic information, worthy of trust, about the condition of our nation's lands, waters, and living resources. Where it is possible to do so, the extent, condition, and use of these precious assets are described. Where it is not possible, we have provided a road map to guide future efforts. These are valuable steps, but the true and lasting value of this project will be realized only if the effort is repeated regularly and is accompanied by significant enhancement of the base of scientific understanding and, high-quality monitoring and reporting programs on which such reports must build.

note on obtaining copies of “The state of the nation’s ecosystems”

The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems may be purchased from Cambridge University Press; see http://us.cambridge.org, or phone toll free: 1-800-872-7243.

The report is also available on-line (as of September 24, 2002) at www.heinzctr.org/ecosystems. This site allows full text access, downloading of PDF copies, and access to the data for most indicators.

Notes and References