Heinz Center Issues First Annual Update to The State of the Nation's Ecosystems

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Heinz Center Issues First Annual Update to The State of the Nation's Ecosystems

The State of the Nation's Ecosystem

WASHINGTON, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, Jan. 14 -/E-Wire/-- The first annual update of the landmark 2002 report The State of the Nation's Ecosystems: Measuring the Lands, Waters, and Living Resources of the United States has been released by The Heinz Center.

Annual updates provide access to data on ecosystem conditions that become available in the 5 years between editions of the full State of the Nation's Ecosystems report. The first State of the Nation's Ecosystems report was published by Cambridge University Press in 2002; the second full edition is scheduled for publication in 2007. Both the 2002 report and the Web-only Update 2003 are available at www.heinzctr.org/ecosystems/report/html.

"Tracking changes in the condition and use of our nation's precious ecosystems is as important as annual medical checkups," said Thomas E. Lovejoy, President of The Heinz Center, "And this first annual update is a crucial step toward making The State of the Nation's Ecosystems into the periodic source of high-quality, nonpartisan information on ecosystems that it was designed to be."

Update 2003 includes updated data for 25 indicators. This represents a quarter of the indicators presented in the Center's 2002 report, and more than 40% of those for which data were available in 2002. These data provide insights into changes in such key ecosystem characteristics as the area of the nation's forests and farmlands, contamination in coastal waters, carbon storage in forests, and key ecosystem "goods and services," such as fish landings, timber harvest, and crop yields. In several cases, Update 2003 also revises data from the 2002 report, based on changes made by the responsible agencies. Overall, however, the new data contained in Annual Update 2003 demonstrate continuation of existing trends; no major deviations were reported.

Update 2003 also includes first-time data for one indicator (Recreation in Forests) for which no data were available in 2002. "We are extremely gratified to be able to report this progress in improving and extending our characterization of the State of the Nation's Ecosystems," said William C. Clark, project head and professor at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.

The H. John Heinz III Center for Science, Economics and the Environment

http://www.heinzctr.org/ecosystems/report/html

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