Natural capital includes both mineral ores, as well as oil and gas (non-renewables) and renewable resources derived from ecosystems. Ecosystems provide many different services to people - they supply us with food and materials, they regulate our water cycles and soils, and they provide us with opportunities for tourism, recreation and reflection. Whereas methods to account for non-renewable resources are well established, the development and application of accounting systems for ecosystems and the services they provide to people is more recent. These systems need to consider the many different types of benefits we derive from ecosystems, the dynamic nature of ecosystems, and their regenerative capacity.

Against this background, the Horizon 2020 project MAIA has been working since November 2018  to promote the mainstreaming of natural capital accounting in EU Member States and Norway. In MAIA, we use the United Nations System of Environmental Economic Accounting – Ecosystem Accounting (SEEA-EA) as the methodological basis for natural capital accounting (NCA). 

Four years down the road, MAIA is happy to announce the project's final conference, which will take place on 20-21 September, 2022 in Brussels, Belgium. 

You can find the full agenda here.