Ecological yield

Ecological yield is the harvestable population growth of an ecosystem, a concept applied most often in forestry, where sustainable practice means harvesting no more wood in a year than regrows within that same year. The same principle extends to water, soil, and any other renewable resource that can be both extracted and naturally replenished, and when removal outpaces renewal, the ecosystem's carrying capacity is reduced over time. The broader ecosystem services provided by the biosphere are valued as exceeding the size of the global economy itself, and yield captures only part of that value, since the natural processes that build biodiversity and preserve habitat add worth beyond harvestable commodities like timber or water. Because atmospheric gases mix relatively evenly worldwide, an ecological yield created in one place, such as a carbon sink, can in principle offset an ecological load released somewhere else entirely. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/