From its vast savanna to its rugged coastlines, to its flower-rich montane grasslands, South Africa\u2019s KwaZulu-Natal province is rich in natural beauty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But those ecosystems are more than just alluring \u2013 they provide services to people by trapping carbon, filtering water, and performing a host of other essential functions. Now, for the first time, a study<\/a> has mapped a suite of the services provided by KwaZulu-Natal\u2019s natural systems and placed a monetary value on them. It\u2019s a key step, experts say, in helping to protect the province\u2019s wild spaces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe services provided to humanity by nature are often undervalued, or not valued at all,\u201d said Salman Hussain, the coordinator of the Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity initiative, which is hosted by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). \u201cBut by showcasing the services that natural systems provide to our economies and societies, we can further the argument for protecting habitats and restoring ecosystems that have already been impacted by development.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n KwaZulu-Natal\u00a0has the second-largest economy of\u00a0South Africa\u2019s\u00a0provinces, contributing around 15\u00a0per cent of the country\u2019s gross domestic product. It also has\u00a0a broad array of\u00a0ecosystems\u00a0and\u00a0a wealth of biodiversity. Read more…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" From its vast savanna to its rugged coastlines, to its flower-rich montane grasslands, South Africa\u2019s KwaZulu-Natal province is rich in natural beauty. But those ecosystems are more than just alluring \u2013 they provide services to people by trapping…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":10415,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10414"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10414\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}