Biodiversity and Ecosystem Accounting

"Businesses play a central role today in the dynamics of ecosystem degradation, and as such are increasingly called upon to contribute to their protection. How, then, can we improve the way businesses take biodiversity issues into account and their involvement in the territorial management of ecosystems? Furthermore, while conservation science and ecology offer a growing number of indicators and data for assessing biodiversity in its many forms, how can this information be structured so that it provides a basis for strategic and collective action and dialogue among stakeholders?

An approach based on environmental accounting as a management science discipline makes it possible to address these issues of structuring environmental indicators and information systems, the responsibilities of the various actors who interact with ecosystems, and the associated forms of accountability.

The field of ecological accounting and its recent developments in biodiversity aims to transform the accounting systems traditionally used by companies to better take into account the value of natural capital (biodiversity, ecosystems), and thus anchor it at the heart of management processes at different levels of corporate management. Innovation in ecological accounting also exists in other areas (national, ecosystem-wide) and can thus help to create links at different levels of ecosystem governance.

Interactive lectures are punctuated by exercises of varying lengths that put students in an active role:

- reading and lively discussion of scientific articles in the field;

- game for comparative analysis of natural capital accounting tools and models, etc.

-A tutorial on applying ecosystem accounting approaches based on a case study.

"At the end of the module, students will be able to identify and compare various accounting models and tools applied to biodiversity at the corporate, ecosystem management, and national levels. They will be able to use the main concepts in the field of social and environmental accounting, as well as the main modes of reasoning behind some of the tools and models proposed, to analyze the challenges of structuring information (ecological, economic, social, etc.) for the ecological management of companies and ecosystems.

The learning objectives are as follows:

- Be able to list and define the main concepts and recall the theoretical specificities of social and environmental accounting approaches, highlighting the particular elements they bring to addressing ecological issues.

- Be able to identify several key issues and distinguish between the different trends shaping the field.

- Be able to name and compare different approaches, models, and tools for biodiversity accounting at different levels (companies, government).

- Be able to explain the major challenges of ecosystem-level accounting approaches and how they complement accounting approaches developed at other levels.

- Know how to use the "ecological contribution accounts" model to structure information for the collective management of an ecosystem, based on a fictional case.

No prior knowledge of accounting in the strict sense of the term is required to follow the module.

Continuous assessment: 100%