This whole Natural Capital initiative (whereby the industry puts price tags on the natural environment) is on the losing side of an argument which — by the very physical principals that guide this earth — will always be decided by nature, not humans.
If there is a ‘Natural Capital’ summit, why not invite nature to it? Why only bankers and corporations?
If we’re meeting to decide the fate of Mother Nature, the least we could do is have that meeting in the forest and be transparent about our intentions. Perhaps something to the effect of:
Hello trees! Hello grasslands! Hello birds! Hello Mother Earth!
Thank you for the abundance of life which you bring to all things.
Thank you for the complex web of reality which you have built and maintain for us, which allows us to survive and flourish.
We hereby decide, as a coalition of corporations, banks, and the general profit-interested subsection of humanity, that we would like to purchase you
so that you might be raped, slashed, burned, and left to die,
and so that we might profit from these actions.
Does that please you, Mother Nature?
Can you please sign on the dotted line?
Nature wouldn’t sign that contract. But if big business (and non profits, politicians, industry leaders, bankers) wish to do this, they should all at least have the decency to confront Mother Nature and tell it to her face.