EARTH LINC · THE LIVING LEDGER

an interactive field notebook · biodiversity, money & 2050

Pull one
thread

everything else moves.

Biodiversity is not a poster of a panda. It is the invisible machinery that keeps water drinkable, crops pollinated, coasts insurable and economies possible. This page is a small game about that machinery: choose a place, pull a thread, watch it turn into money, risk and the year 2050 — then loop back and find the one thing you can do on Monday morning.

There is no winning screen. The chains loop back to where they began. You can leave at any node and return.

oceanforestwetlandsoil & grasslandcity

every number here has a source. 40 of them are listed at the bottom — go and argue with them.

the rules, the maths, the point

three sticky notes ↓

How to play

Pick a place. Click a thread. Every click opens the next link in a real chain — species → service → money → risk. Chains loop: they end where they started, with one action you can actually take. Click any chip in the trail to jump back.

How I counted

The calculator uses three public coefficients: land per diet (Poore & Nemecek, 2018), a sector multiplier, and a mean ecosystem-service value of US$2,400 per hectare per year (derived from Costanza et al., 2014). It is a teaching estimate — an order of magnitude, not an audit. For a real one, see SBTN and TNFD.

What this is

A station: part notebook, part board game, part balance sheet. Made to be argued with. If a number here is out of date, that is the point — go and check the source, then update your own copy.

choose your ground

start with the one you know

The Ocean

reef · kelp · mangrove · open blue

what it is

Half the oxygen you breathed today came from the sea. Coral reefs cover 0.2% of the ocean floor and shelter about 25% of all marine species.

what is good

Protection is finally growing: the High Seas Treaty (BBNJ, 2023) created the first legal route to protected areas beyond national waters, and blue bonds in Seychelles and Belize turned sovereign debt into 30% ocean protection.

risk level & whenHIGH

At 1.5°C of warming, 70–90% of tropical coral reefs decline; at 2°C, more than 99% (IPCC SR1.5). 37.7% of fish stocks are fished beyond biological limits (FAO, 2024). Only 8.4% of the ocean is protected and 2.7% fully so. The 1.5°C window closes in the early 2030s.

the money

The ocean economy is worth about US$2.5 trillion a year; reefs and mangroves prevent roughly US$65 billion of flood damage annually.

One reef bleaches.

The water sits one degree too warm for too long. The coral expels the algae living inside it and turns white.

Reefs = 0.2% of the seafloor, ~25% of all marine species.

links followed: 0

money talks

one ledger, two sides
Global GDP moderately or highly dependent on natureWEF, 2020
US$44 tn/yr
Annual value of the world's ecosystem services (2011 estimate)Costanza et al., 2014
US$125 tn/yr
Business value unlocked by nature-positive transitions by 2030WEF, 2020
US$10.1 tn
Jobs those same transitions could create by 2030WEF, 2020
395 m
The annual biodiversity finance gapDeutz et al., 2020
−US$700 bn/yr
Environmentally harmful subsidies paid every single yearBloombergNEF, 2022
−US$1.7 tn/yr
Finance promised by 2030 (Kunming–Montreal Target 19)CBD GBF, 2022
US$200 bn/yr
Monitored wildlife populations, 1970–2020WWF Living Planet Report, 2024
−73%
Species threatened with extinctionIPBES, 2019
1,000,000
Land protected today / promised by 2030Protected Planet, 2024 · GBF Target 3
17.6% → 30%
Ocean protected today / fully protectedProtected Planet · Marine Protection Atlas
8.4% / 2.7%

The bill is not in the future. It is already being paid — just not by the people who ordered.

two versions of 2050

flip the switch →

drift — the ledger stays open

2030

Warming crosses 1.5°C. 70–90% of tropical coral reefs decline (IPCC SR1.5). The US$700bn/yr gap is still open; harmful subsidies still outspend nature finance several times over.

2040

Amazon deforestation approaches the 20–25% band where forest flips toward savanna (Lovejoy & Nobre, 2018). Insurers withdraw from tropical coasts and floodplains; “uninsurable” becomes a normal word on mortgage forms.

2050

In the World Bank's ecosystem-collapse scenario the world loses US$2.7 trillion of GDP a year by 2030 alone; low-income countries lose up to 10%. Food prices carry the loss of pollinators and soil.

turn — the ledger closes

2030

30% of land and sea protected, connected and well-managed (GBF Target 3). US$200bn/yr flowing (Target 19); US$500bn/yr of harmful subsidies redirected (Target 18). Nature-positive business: US$10.1tn and 395 million jobs.

2040

Restoration at scale: every US$1 invested returns US$7–30 in benefits (UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration). Rewetted peat stops emitting within a season; fish biomass inside fully protected areas multiplies.

2050

The CBD's 2050 vision: living in harmony with nature. Nature enters the balance sheet as an asset, not an externality; cities are designed as habitat; the ledger closes.

count your own line

person · school · community · company

A teaching estimate, not an audit. For the real thing: SBTN target-setting plus TNFD disclosure.

land you borrow every year
0.55 hectares
that is, in football pitches
0.8
ecosystem-service value at stake, per year
US$1,320
if you cut it 30% by 2030 — value kept by 2050
US$10,300

hectares = people × plate(ha/yr) × ground multiplier  ·  value = hectares × US$2,400/ha/yr (Costanza et al., 2014: US$125tn ÷ ~51.6bn ha)  ·  1 pitch = 0.714 ha  ·  2050 figure = 30% × value × 26 years

the world's report card

what's good · what's trending · what's missing
Latin America

★ Costa Rica

goodPayments for ecosystem services funded by a fuel tax since 1997 took forest cover from ~26% back above 50%; ecotourism became a pillar of the economy.
trendRights-of-nature law is spreading: Ecuador's constitution (2008), Colombia's Atrato River ruling (2016).
missingThe Cerrado and Gran Chaco savannas now clear faster than the Amazon with a fraction of the attention — they lack the word “forest”.
Asia

★ China & Bhutan

goodChina's Ecological Conservation Red Lines cover roughly 30% of its land, the Yangtze's ten-year fishing ban began in 2021, and Kunming–Montreal set the global 2030 targets. Bhutan's constitution requires 60% forest cover, forever.
trendMangrove replanting, national park systems, green finance taxonomies and the first corporate nature-disclosure pilots.
missingFreshwater and intertidal mudflats: the Yellow Sea has lost most of its tidal flats, the weakest link for migratory shorebirds. Soil biodiversity is barely mapped.
Africa

★ Gabon & Namibia

goodGabon keeps 88% forest cover and 13 national parks, and refinanced US$500m of debt for ocean protection in 2023. Namibia's 86 communal conservancies put wildlife income in local hands.
trendDebt-for-nature swaps, community-run conservancies, sovereign credit used as conservation leverage.
missingMoney. Africa holds a large share of global biodiversity and receives a small share of global nature finance; outside flagship parks, monitoring data is thin.
Europe

★ The EU & the Netherlands

goodThe 2024 Nature Restoration Regulation requires restoration on 20% of EU land and sea by 2030 and all degraded ecosystems by 2050; CSRD makes nature reporting mandatory for tens of thousands of companies. Room for the River gave floodplains back to the water.
trendMandatory disclosure, urban rewilding, restoration written into law rather than into a vision statement.
missingFarmland. Common farmland bird numbers are down around 60% since 1980, and agricultural subsidies still pull against the restoration law.
Oceania & islands

★ Aotearoa, Seychelles, Belize

goodThe Whanganui River became a legal person in 2017 (Te Awa Tupua Act); Seychelles issued the world's first sovereign blue bond (2018); Belize's 2021 blue bond cut national debt by roughly 12% of GDP in exchange for protecting 30% of its ocean.
trendBlue bonds, legal personhood, and ocean governance led by Indigenous and island communities.
missingThe Great Barrier Reef has bleached en masse repeatedly since 2016; the High Seas Treaty still needs ratification and enforcement to bite.
North America

★ Canada & the USA

goodCanada's Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas and Guardians programmes; the USA's “America the Beautiful” 30x30 goal; New York's watershed and Philadelphia's green infrastructure proved nature beats concrete on cost.
trendIndigenous-led conservation, and city water utilities buying nature instead of pipes.
missingFreshwater species and insects. North America has lost around 3 billion birds since 1970 (Rosenberg et al., 2019) with little dedicated funding.

the global blind spots — and why they stay blind

  • Freshwater. Monitored freshwater populations are down 85% since 1970 — the steepest of any realm, and the least funded. Why: rivers cross borders and budgets.
  • Grasslands and savannas. The least protected major biome, often mapped as “wasteland” and converted without a permit. Why: no charismatic canopy.
  • Soil and fungi. Up to 59% of Earth's species live in soil; only ~155,000 of an estimated 2.5 million fungal species are described. Why: invisible, and unpriced.
  • The deep sea and the high seas. Just 2.7% of the ocean is fully protected; the BBNJ treaty awaits ratification. Why: nobody's jurisdiction.
  • Money that reaches local hands. Indigenous peoples and local communities steward much of the world's remaining biodiversity yet receive a tiny fraction of nature finance. Why: funds are built for institutions, not communities.

open a door

a random wonder. press it more than once.
A single teaspoon of healthy soil can hold up to 10 billion organisms — more living things than there are people on Earth. FAO & ITPS, State of Knowledge of Soil Biodiversity, 2020

do one thing, then return

today · this season · by 2030

Today

under ten minutes

This season

within three months

By 2030

the long line

sources & deeper dives

every number came from here

global assessments

  1. IPBES (2019) Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services — ipbes.net
  2. IPBES (2016) Assessment on Pollinators, Pollination and Food Production — ipbes.net
  3. IPBES (2020) Workshop Report on Biodiversity and Pandemics
  4. WWF (2024) Living Planet Report 2024 — livingplanet.panda.org
  5. IPCC (2018) Special Report: Global Warming of 1.5°C — ipcc.ch
  6. FAO (2024) The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture — fao.org
  7. FAO (2020) Global Forest Resources Assessment — fao.org
  8. FAO & ITPS (2020) State of Knowledge of Soil Biodiversity
  9. Ramsar Convention (2021) Global Wetland Outlook — ramsar.org
  10. UNEP-WCMC & IUCN, Protected Planet Report — protectedplanet.net
  11. CBD (2022) Kunming–Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework — cbd.int
  12. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species — iucnredlist.org

money & finance

  1. World Economic Forum (2020) Nature Risk Rising & The Future of Nature and Business — weforum.org
  2. Deutz et al. (2020) Financing Nature: Closing the Global Biodiversity Financing Gap, Paulson Institute / NatureVest
  3. World Bank (2021) The Economic Case for Nature — worldbank.org
  4. Costanza et al. (2014) “Changes in the global value of ecosystem services”, Global Environmental Change
  5. ELD Initiative (2015) The Value of Land
  6. BloombergNEF (2022) Biodiversity Finance Factbook (harmful subsidies ≈ US$1.7tn/yr)
  7. TNFD (2023) Recommendations — tnfd.global
  8. Science Based Targets Network (2023) Targets for Nature — sciencebasedtargetsnetwork.org
  9. Chami et al. (IMF, 2019) Nature's Solution to Climate Change — imf.org
  10. UNEP & FAO, UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration — unep.org

ecosystems & specific numbers

  1. Beck et al. (2018) “The global flood protection savings provided by coral reefs”, Nature Communications
  2. Narayan et al. (2017) “Coastal wetlands and flood damage reduction”, Scientific Reports
  3. Spalding et al. (2017) “Mapping the global value of coral reef tourism”, Marine Policy
  4. Anthony, Bender & van der Heijden (2023) “Enumerating soil biodiversity”, PNAS
  5. Hawkins et al. (2023) “Mycorrhizal mycelium as a global carbon pool”, Current Biology
  6. Estrada, Botzen & Tol (2017) “A global economic assessment of city policies to reduce climate change impacts”, Nature Climate Change
  7. Poore & Nemecek (2018) “Reducing food's environmental impacts through producers and consumers”, Science
  8. Lovejoy & Nobre (2018) “Amazon tipping point”, Science Advances
  9. Rosenberg et al. (2019) “Decline of the North American avifauna”, Science
  10. Global Forest Watch / WRI, annual tree-cover-loss data — globalforestwatch.org
  11. Our World in Data — land use, diets, biodiversity — ourworldindata.org

places & policies

  1. Costa Rica, FONAFIFO payments for ecosystem services (since 1997)
  2. Gabon (2023) US$500m debt-for-nature refinancing; Belize (2021) Blue Bond; Seychelles (2018) sovereign blue bond
  3. New Zealand, Te Awa Tupua (Whanganui River Claims Settlement) Act 2017
  4. European Union (2024) Nature Restoration Regulation; CSRD/ESRS E4 — environment.ec.europa.eu
  5. China, Ecological Conservation Red Line policy; Yangtze ten-year fishing ban (2021); Yancheng migratory bird sanctuaries, World Heritage (2019)
  6. Singapore Index on Cities' Biodiversity (CBD) — cbd.int
  7. Namibia communal conservancies (NACSO); Philadelphia Water Department, Green City, Clean Waters; Quintana Roo coral reef insurance (2019, TNC); BBNJ High Seas Treaty (2023)