Assessing ecosystem services for informing land-use decisions: a problem-oriented approach

Abstract

ABSTRACT. Assessments of ecosystem services (ES), that aim at informing decisions on land management, are increasing in number around the globe. Despite selected success stories, evidence for ES information being used in decision making is weak, partly because ES assessments are found to fall short in targeting information needs by decision makers. To improve their applicability in practice, we compared existing concepts of ES assessments with focus on informing land use decisions and identified opportunities for enhancing the relevance of ES assessments for decision making. In a process of codesign, building on experience of four projects in Brazil, China, Madagascar, and Vietnam, we developed a step-wise approach for better targeting ES assessments toward information needs in land use decisions. Our problem-oriented approach aims at (1) structuring ES information according to land use problems identified by stakeholders, (2) targeting context-specific ES information needs by decision makers, and (3) assessing relevant management options. We demonstrate how our approach contributes to making ES assessments more policy relevant and enhances the application of ES assessments as a tool for decision support.

The LEGATO cross-disciplinary integrated ecosystem service research framework: an example of integrating research results from the analysis of global change impacts and the social, cultural and economic system dynamics of irrigated rice production

“…3). In order to mobilise the service supply potential attributed to an ESF, and to mitigate potential disservices (Förster et al 2015), at least for provisioning and cultural ESS, the (conscious) investment of time, labour, physical resources and often money as a means to mobilise them is required to produce ecosystem services in order to gain a benefit, as depicted in Fig. 10.…”

“…The goal here is to demonstrate the benefits of such collaboration and show how progress can be made towards a synthesis by stepwise integration of multi-disciplinary results produced from studying multiple aspects of complex, dynamically changing agricultural landscapes (Förster et al 2015) within a transdisciplinary project design. We illustrate the process drawing on the example of the transdisciplinary LEGATO project, and its studies of the ecosystem services (ESS) provided by rice agro-ecosystems in SEA (Settele et al 2013, their generation and use.…”

Interlinking ecosystem services and Ostrom’s framework through orientation in sustainability research

“…3). Local-level research projects are well situated for assessing target knowledge due to the more iterative nature of the process between the producers and users of ES knowledge (Haines-Young and Potschin 2014, Förster et al 2015).…”

Doing what with whom? Stakeholder analysis in a large transdisciplinary research project in South-East Asia

“…Section three presents results, describing which stakeholders were chosen to be involved in the project, why and how. Section four discusses the outcome, the participation realised against the real-world odds, and the difficulties encountered both on the side of the project and on the stakeholders' sides (in plural due to the diversity of their positions and the resulting conflicts, Förster et al 2015). Section five draws some conclusions for improving the stakeholder involvement in future large research projects.…”

“…A condition for this is to monitor not only the project success factors, but also be on lookout for potential unintended and unexpected negative effects. They might occur, for instance, by the project helping to optimise one ecosystem service at the expense of another, locally important one, not recognised by the experts, or by interfering with the prevailing distributional mechanisms and potential conflicts (Förster et al 2015). This may be necessary in order to break up existing "lock-in situations", for example, to substitute ecological intensification and ecological engineering for high-input farm management systems, but this needs to be pursued carefully (Spangenberg et al 2015b).…”