The economic value of the nation’s forests

Forests provide tremendous economic value to communities and the nation. They provide timber, safe clean drinking water, recreation opportunities, and countless other benefits. However, these values are missing or undercounted in the nation's economic statistics (for example, in GDP).

Photo Credit

USDA photo by Ali Freibott.

Forest Service researchers developed the first ever environmental-economic statistics for the United States. Natural capital accounts measure the value of forests, across a wide array of benefits, using international standards for economic statistics. The goal is to develop something akin to a green GDP that captures the value of the nation's environmental assets. The approach is a mix of financial tools and accounting methods to create environmental balance sheets. It is a straightforward measure of sustainability being adopted throughout the world as part of an international standard called the System of National Accounts.

This work brings forest values into the System of National Accounts and creates consistent measures of forest values. This enables better communication about the value of forests to stakeholders. Managers can use the data to guide decisions, for example locations of fuels treatments. More broadly, the U.S. can use the values to see if national wealth, including the value of nature, is going up or down over time. Finally, it can create investment opportunities for future forest health. 

Initial products include estimates for merchantable and pre-merchantable timber values, contributions of recreation to local communities, and the value of water from national forests. It is also being used to estimate benefits of fuels treatments in high-risk landscapes and guide conservation finance decisions in watershed investments.