Future Work
This paper is a first attempt by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to develop UK Freshwater
ecosystem assets and services accounts. There are a number of challenges and issues that
need to be addressed in improving these accounts over time. These estimates are developed
as part of the roadmap “Accounting for the value of nature in the UK”, which set out a strategy to
incorporate natural capital into the UK Environmental Accounts by 2020. As such, the methodology
of these accounts will be improved before they are fully incorporated into the UK Environmental
Accounts. ONS is publishing an updated roadmap for the next five years (2015 – 2020) alongside
this document. The updated roadmap highlights that the freshwater accounts would be improved
and data gaps would be addressed during the next five years.