ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews concepts and methods in the valuation of ecosystems and biodiversity with a focus on ecosystem services. Valuation of ecosystem services is an increasingly used tool for decision-making and planning whose scope of application can range from awareness raising to policy instrument design, priority setting, and environmental litigations in courts, among others. Despite its monetary focus, the initiative Economics of Ecosystem Services and Biodiversity also acknowledges that valuation involves dealing with 'conflicting valuation languages" that can be "in a relation of incommensurability with each other'. In the literature on ecosystem services, the term ecological value has often been used in relation to the status and condition of the ecosystem functions, processes, and components on which ecosystem service delivery depends. Ecologists and environmental scientists have traditionally used the term ecological value to refer to biophysical parameters or impact indicators that are scaled and weighted in order to inform decisions.
