The World Wildlife Fund’s latest Living Planet report makes for unsettling reading. It highlights what it calls an “astonishing” 60 per cent fall in wildlife populations in little over 40 years. As mankind’s footprint continues to grow — only a quarter of all land remains substantially free of the impact of human activities, and this is projected to decline to 10 per cent by 2050 — wildlife is visibly suffering.

Many of the planet’s other natural assets, including ecosystems, water, land, minerals and the atmosphere, are faring little better. Earth Overshoot Day, the point in the annual calendar when more natural resources have been consumed than the planet can regenerate in a year, fell on 1 August this year, earlier than ever before. Put another way, mankind is now consuming 70 per cent more natural resources each year than the earth can sustain.

Valued by the WWF at $125tn a year, nature’s services — the supply of raw materials, water, food, energy, crop pollination, soil enrichment and erosion protection — are vital components of the wealth of nations. They need to be far better protected. One way to do this would be to factor the depletion and degradation of natural assets in to economic forecasting. Little account is currently taken in long-range growth projections of the planet’s ability to support continued growth.