What has nature ever done for us? Q&A with author

Annabella Macris

30 January 2013

• In the week it was published, it was the most reviewed book, according to The Bookseller.
• Three weeks after publication, it's already on its fourth print run.

What's making such waves in the world of publishing? A new Harry Potter book?

Incredibly, it's Tony Juniper's What Has Nature Ever Done For Us?, a timely analysis of our relationship with nature. So I was really excited to hear him talk at Friends of the Earth's Book Club last week, where he was clearly encouraged by this success.

Tony started off  with an explanation of the Earth as a sealed biosphere with many complex systems and balances that create the conditions necessary for life. I guess I've always known how delicate this balance is, but he presents facts in a way you can't ignore. "If these systems do not function properly, then human life and indeed the economy will fail" he says.

Juniper's a natural story-teller. His talk brought to life the statistics and case studies that blow the lid off dated economic thinking. Trading nature against economic growth doesn't stack up any more.  And it's not just us environmentalists who are beginning to challenge decisions.

I'm looking forward to hearing more from Tony soon, in an exclusive interview on Friends of the Earth podcast. But in the meantime, here's some questions we asked him last week.

Can the arguments in your book build a movement for change?

TJ: The big challenge for the environment is that a lot of people just don't get it. We are communicating a lot of data and ideas but i t's like talking Polish to someone who speaks Swahili.

A lot of business people are not hostile to these ideas but they have a different mind-set. One way of relocating people inside natural systems is to do so through an economic lens. It helps to set it out in a way that makes sense to them.

What is the argument for protecting those species with no economic value?

TJ: We continue to campaign for those species as we have been doing before - for reasons of beauty and from a moral responsibility to hand the natural world intact to the next generation. And where we can, we make a compelling case for economic value. It is not a case of "either/or" it is "both/and."

By putting an economic value on nature some people might see it as something to be traded. What are the risks of this approach?

TJ: We are at five minutes to midnight now and if we are to stop the mass extinction of plants and animals and hang onto just some of our living conditions we must use new tools. Science and data have only taken us so far. We need to look at the economic value of nature.

Making an economic valuation is getting the attention of the policy-makers who don't normally listen.

What kind of economy would result from this analysis?

TJ: The present model for growth is finished; a greener version of it won't have much impact either. We need a totally new system: a bio-economy. The Earth is a sealed biosphere and we can only produce and design things that the biosphere can withstand. Engineers and ecologists need to work in a new partnership to achieve this.

Buy a signed copy - with free P&P

Use the special code BOOKCLUB when you order What has Nature Ever Done for Us? from Friends of the Earth Shop.

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