Introduction to the Ecosystem-Centered Accounting Framework (ECAF). A collective accounting method in support of biodiversity protection strategies[Introduction au Cadre de Comptabilité Écosystème-Centrée. Une méthode comptable collective à l’appui des stratégies de préservation de la biodiversité]

The purpose of this document is to present the Ecosystem-Centered Accounting Framework, the fruit of several years of research. It proposes an initial formalisation of this approach, which is intended to be a methodological proposal, with the aim of supporting the organisation of action to protect biodiversity in a variety of contexts. The use of the term «accounting» applied to biodiversity and ecosystems is often assimilated, because of their calculatory and sometimes monetary nature, to methods of economic evaluation of ecosystem services and biodiversity. It also frequently refers to approaches aimed at assessing the impacts of human activities on biodiversity and at ensuring the accountability of organisations with regard to these impacts, or to ecosystem accounting approaches developed at national level. However, the notion of ‘accounting' takes on a new meaning here. The main aim of the «ecosystem-centered » accounting approach presented is to provide a theoretical foundation for, and to design and test, an accounting framework to help public and private stakeholders organise and develop strategies for co-managing an ecosystem (a lagoon, a forest, the habitat of a species, etc.) in order to achieve targets in terms of ecological conditions. This involves proposing a collective accounting system that enables organisations interdependent with the same ecosystem to share knowledge and information in order to assess and assign responsibility for its degradation, on the one hand; and to negotiate commitments and monitor the contributions of each party to its conservation/restoration, on the other. Being able to assess the ecological performance of these contributions is all the more necessary at a time when many companies, investors and public bodies are making increasing declarations of their intention to contribute to biodiversity. To this end, the Ecosystem-Centered Accounting Framework (ECAF) proposes classifying ecological and socio-economic information in such a way that by filling-in and using the different accounts, stakeholders are encouraged to discuss the crucial issues involved in organising their respective responsibilities and contributive commitments. The different ‘accounts' proposed thus refer to different key dimensions of strategic ecosystem management: • definition of the «ecological matters of concerns» at stake and evaluation of the collective results achieved in relation to the good ecological conditions targets ; • evaluation and prioritisation of the negative impacts of the various stakeholders or sectors concerned; • identification and evaluation of the various types of positive contributions to the ecosystem (direct and indirect); • recognition of the levels of effort and costs made by each party to provide these contributions; • fair allocation of financial resources and other means in return for these actions and efforts; • social values derived from the protection of the ecosystem. The ecosystem-centered accounting approach recognises the wide diversity of ecosystem governance and management contexts and does not promote ready-made solutions. Defining how accounts can be used for negotiation and long-term management between stakeholders requires an in-depth analysis of the realities of the dynamics of collective action, power relations, strategic interactions and institutional structures at play in each given ecosystem. In each socio-ecological situation, however, the main accounts (ecological results, pressures, contributions) retain the same general nomenclature, which means that a shared grammar can be used to guide action and to analyse and compare these situations despite their heterogeneity. This document is structured in three main parts. Part One reviews the general idea of developing accounting systems for the collective management of ecosystems and briefly presents the field and the research programme to which this proposal belongs. The challenges and advantages of developing ecosystem-centered accounting for various categories of stakeholder (biodiversity managers, private stakeholders, public stakeholders, citizens) are then presented. This section concludes with a discussion of the advantages of approaching the challenges of quantifying nature from the perspective of (management) accounting, which helps to highlight the key differences between the Ecosystem-Centered Accounting Framework that we are proposing and other approaches. Part Two presents the Ecosystem-Centered Accounting Framework proper. We introduce the general architecture of the system of accounts structured in three main levels, and the type of problematisation of the collective management of an ecosystem that it induces. We then review these three account levels, describing each of the proposed accounts they cover. A fictitious example is developed to illustrate the point, clarify the nomenclature of the proposed accounts and the way in which they can be built. The concepts and theoretical grounds underlying each of the proposed accounts are also introduced and briefly discussed. Part Three shows how the Ecosystem-Centered Accounting Framework can be used in collective intervention processes to protect an ecosystem. Three contrasting fictitious scenarios are introduced to illustrate the point. The Perspectives section concludes by calling for scaling-up experimentation and implementation of the ecosystem-centered accounting approach, and the lines of enquiry opened up by this proposal to be extended