Spotlight on the ‘Extent of ecosystems’ indicator
The INBO has launched a brand-new nature indicator: Extent of ecosystems. The indicator shows how the area of our ecosystems changed between 2016 and 2022. With this indicator, INBO is fulfilling its obligation to report these new environmental economic accounts to Eurostat every three years. Environmental economic accounts are statistics that governments use to monitor and steer their economic policy. They contain information on, amongst other things, the size, quality and services provided by ecosystems. The indicator shows a clear trend: a decline in grasslands and an increase in residential areas and other man-made areas.
Grasslands fulfil various functions, particularly in terms of biodiversity, food supply, climate and water management. The loss of grasslands therefore has direct consequences for biodiversity, environmental buffering, local water management and agriculture.
Between 2016 and 2022, a net total of 11,100 hectares of grassland was lost. What happened to that lost area? It was largely taken up by additional space for housing, industry and commerce, transport and recreation. This so-called ‘land take’ increased by almost 9,200 hectares. Over this period, this amounted to around 4 hectares per day. Arable land also lost some ground. The extent of our forests and other ecosystems remained more or less the same or showed a slight increase.
These figures come as no surprise. Almost three-quarters of the new development came at the expense of grassland. The remainder was taken from arable land and woodland. Previous research in the 2020 Nature Report had already shown that the decline in grassland and the advance of development were also the dominant trends between 2013 and 2016. The pressure on our open spaces therefore remains high.