🌱 Restoring the River of Grass: The $1 Trillion Business Case for the Everglades

The Everglades & its Trillion-Dollar Asset on South Florida

FEATURED CONTENT:
Learn why the ongoing efforts to restore the Everglades are a $1 trillion engine behind Florida’s future in our latest Interview with the Everglades Foundation.

Florida’s economic future flows through the Everglades.

It is not only the source of drinking water for nine million residents across the South Florida region, but it also has a direct impact on our tourism, real estate values, and more.

The Everglades generates over $1 trillion in value and nearly $31.5 billion in annual economic benefits for the region, according to the central finding of the Everglades Foundation’s recent report, Thriving Everglades, Thriving Economy: Nature’s Value in the Everglades.

Dr. Meenakshi Chabba, Ecosystem and Resilience Scientist and one of the report’s authors, puts it plainly: “Miami and South Florida wouldn’t exist without the Everglades.”

The reason is simple. “It is the water that we drink, the one we shower with, as well as the one that we run our businesses with,” she notes in our recent Opportunity Miami Interview.

Each year, rainfall is absorbed into the sponge-like landscape of the Everglades and delivered to the Biscayne Aquifer—our lifeline for clean, affordable water.

Some fun facts: The Everglades is the world’s largest subtropical wilderness, the largest mangrove ecosystem in the western hemisphere, and one of only two places on Earth where alligators and crocodiles coexist.

A Trillion-Dollar Natural Asset

The Everglades is a national park, an ecological wonder, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. But it is also one of Florida’s most valuable pieces of economic infrastructure.

“The greater Everglades ecosystem is really a natural capital asset worth $1 trillion,” Dr. Chabba noted, adding that the benefits intersect with nearly every corner of Florida’s modern economy.

The report broke down the main sectors, some of which include $9.2 billion in real estate value; $8.5 billion from outdoor recreation and tourism; $8.4 billion in flood protection through natural storm-buffering; $1 billion in clean freshwater value annually; and others.

And that’s just what can be measured today. “This is a conservative estimate,” Dr. Chabba emphasized. “There is much more research that we need to do to understand the complex relationship we have with the Everglades ecosystem and our economic behavior.”

Read the full report here.

The bigger takeaway is that 25% of economic activity across the 16-county South Florida watershed (see page 7 for the map of this region) depends on clean freshwater—and that freshwater depends on the Everglades.

The Problem: Pollution and a Century of Disruption

Dr. Chabba noted that this economic engine is not guaranteed. More than a century of canal construction, drainage, and urban development reduced the Everglades to half its original size, fracturing the natural water flows that sustained Florida for millennia.

The highly engineered system of canals and levees for flood management has led to issues from toxic algal blooms to droughts to saltwater intrusion into our water supply. The 2017/18 red tide event alone cost the state of Florida more than $1 billion in tourism and hospitality losses.

The Solution: Restore the Flow And the Economy

For the past 25 years, state and federal leaders have undertaken what is now known as the largest ecosystem restoration project in the world. The Everglades Foundation plays a central role: it is the only nonprofit that works solely for restoring and protecting the Everglades, explained Dr. Chabba of the 32-year-old environmental organization.

“Sound science is at the core of what we do,” she added, ensuring progress and grounding the work in research and bipartisan advocacy.

Restoration projects today are large-scale, transformative, and increasingly visible. Among them is the sweeping Everglades Agricultural Area Reservoir—a project so significant that the Foundation’s chief scientist calls it “the bypass surgery of the Everglades.” At 26 square miles alongside its constructed wetland—larger than Manhattan—it will store, clean, and move water south for the first time in a century. It’s slated for completion in 2029.

And restoration is already delivering results such as decreased levels of salinity in Florida Bay, increased biodiversity, and fewer seagrass die-offs.

As Dr. Chabba added: “Restoration is working.”

It is also powering a massive clean water economy that includes 84,000 businesses, generating $223 billion annually and employing two million people.

The Economic Case for Investment

Despite a 4:1 return on investment, restoration funding is not guaranteed. The system requires continued annual appropriations and advocacy despite a 50/50 commitment from the state and federal government.

“This is a precious asset that is worth investing in…we cannot afford not to,” she stressed.

Continued restoration efforts ensure a more resilient South Florida that is better protected from storms and saltwater intrusion, while also providing a stronger economic backbone supported by stable water supplies.

“Clean water can only come from a healthy Everglades,” she added. Our economic future rests on this clean water that will deliver benefits for future generations.

Her message is clear: “If we invest in the Everglades, we are investing in our economic prosperity.”

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~ Opportunity Miami