Ecosystem services in decision making: time to deliver

Abstract

w ww ww w. .f fr ro on nt ti ie er rs si in ne ec co ol lo og gy y. .o or rg g T he Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA) advanced a powerful vision for the future (MA 2005), and now it is time to deliver. The vision of the MA -and of the prescient ecologists and economists whose work formed its foundation -is a world in which people and institutions appreciate natural systems as vital assets, recognize the central roles these assets play in supporting human well-being, and routinely incorporate their material and intangible values into decision making. This vision is now beginning to take hold, fueled by innovations from around the world -from pioneering local leaders to government bureaucracies, and from traditional cultures to major corporations (eg a new experimental wing of Goldman Sachs; Daily and Ellison 2002;Bhagwat and Rutte 2006;Kareiva and Marvier 2007;Ostrom et al. 2007;Goldman et al. 2008). China, for instance, is investing over 700 billion yuan (about US$102.6 billion) in ecosystem service payments, in the current decade (Liu et al. 2008).The goal of the Natural Capital Project -a partnership between Stanford University, The Nature Conservancy, and World Wildlife Fund (www.naturalcapitalproject.org) -is to help integrate ecosystem services into everyday decision making around the world. This requires turning the valuation of ecosystem services into effective policy and finance mechanisms -a problem that, as yet, no one has solved on a large scale. A key challenge remains: relative to other forms of capital, assets embodied in ecosystems are often poorly understood, rarely monitored, and are undergoing rapid degradation (Heal 2000a; MA 2005;Mäler et al. 2008). The importance of ecosystem services is often recognized only after they have been lost, as was the case following Hurricane Katrina (Chambers et al. 2007). Natural capital, and the ecosystem services that flow from it, are usually undervalued -by governments, businesses, and the public -if indeed they are considered at all (Daily et al. 2000;Balmford et al. 2002; NRC 2005).Two fundamental changes need to occur in order to replicate, scale up, and sustain the pioneering efforts that are currently underway, to give ecosystem services weight in decision making. First, the science of ecosystem services needs to advance rapidly. In promising a return (of services) on investments in nature, the scientific community needs to deliver the knowledge and tools necessary to forecast and quantify this return. To help address this challenge, the Natural Capital Project has developed InVEST (a system for Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem I In n a a n nu ut ts sh he el ll l: : ECOSYSTEM SERVICES ECOSYSTEM SERVICES ECOSYSTEM SERVICES Ecosystem services in decision making• Valuing nature is central to mainstreaming conservation, but is not an end in itself • Success hinges on a better understanding of ecosystem production functions and on integrating research (and experimentation) into the development of new policies and institutions • The Natural Capital Pr...

A review on trade-off analysis of ecosystem services for sustainable land-use management

“…To address above interdisciplinary and complex problems, multi-criteria analysis, as a tool that can take both ecological and socioeconomic criteria into consideration, is mostly applied to conduct ecological economic analysis (Huang et al, 2011;Fontana et al, 2013). Multi-criteria analysis had been applied in various disciplinary researches and recently been broadly introduced and utilized to solve the problems in ecosystem services management (Daily et al, 2009;Nelson et al, 2009). For example, Cheung and Sumaila (2008) applied the multi-criteria analysis to explore the trade-offs between conflicting conservation and socioeconomic objectives for tropical marine ecosystems management.…”

“…In addition, since each ecosystem service is not independent, but instead exhibits complex interactions, which will further lead to different environmental or socioeconomic outcomes related to different individuals or groups (Rodríguez et al, 2006). Over time, in spite of the great progress and success in the assessment of ecosystem services trade-offs, the practical application in land-use management decision is limited (Daily et al, 2009). The underlying reason is that most studies have been focused on one or a few services without considering the interdependence and highly non-linear relationships among the ecosystem services (Ring et al, 2010).…”

Biogeography and conservation in Southeast Asia: how 2.7 million years of repeated environmental fluctuations affect today’s patterns and the future of the remaining refugial-phase biodiversity

“…Like it or not, conservation scientists have a responsibility to help change this approach to nature and (1) ensure that full valuations of biodiversity, ecosystems and ecological services are available and considered in the review of development projects (Daily 1997;Baimai and Brockelman 1998;Daily and Matson 2008;Daily et al 2009;Dasgupta 2010;Mooney 2010;Sodhi et al 2007Sodhi et al , 2010 and, more importantly, (2) help educate regional leaders and people who influence the policy making process (Clark 2001). Bierbaum and Zoellick (2009) note that we need more centers of excellence to build capacity across public and private sectors to enable innovative education programs, technologies, market solutions, and management practices.…”

Conservation opportunities across the world's anthromes

“…Modifying human livelihood goals to incorporate and deliver on conservation goals Agroecology Perrings et al (2006) Promote integrated study of the entire food system, including ecological, economic and human dimensions Conservation in urban areas McKinney (2002) Develop ecologically informed public through study of urban ecology; design anthropogenic landscapes to promote biodiversity and ecosystem services Ecosystem stewardship Chapin et al (2010) Foster social-ecological sustainability on a rapidly changing planet Land sharing/land sparing Phalan et al (2011) Address biodiversity conservation alongside agronomic production goals Reconciliation ecology Rosenzweig (2003) Redesign anthropogenic habitats so that their use is compatible with use by broad array of other species 2. Modifying conservation goals to deliver on human livelihood goals Ecosystem-based adaptation Jones et al (2012) Use of biodiversity and ecosystem services to help people and communities adapt to the negative effects of climate change Ecosystem services Daily et al (2009) Give 'natural capital', which produces ecosystem services, adequate weight (monetary value) in decision-making processes 3. Redefining conservation goals given global change Conserving the stage Anderson & Ferree (2011) Implement conservation in a manner that maximizes potential evolutionary adaptive response to climate change as opposed to trying to save all species or picking winners Ecological connectivity Krosby et al (2010) Soften the matrix; increase connectivity to increase probability of persistence for many organisms as climate changes Intervention ecology Hobbs et al (2011) Rather than attempt to restore past systems, reinstate the capacity for ecosystem functions and processes Managed relocation Richardson et al (2009) Save species from effects of climate change by transporting them to areas where they have not previously occurred, also termed 'assisted colonization' and 'assisted migration' Novel ecosystems Seastedt et al (2008) Recognize new combinations of species under new abiotic conditions ('novel ecosystems') and focus on desired outcomes or trajectories Realignment Millar & Brubaker (2006) Realign or entrain ecosystems with current and expected future conditions rather than restoring to historical pre-disturbance conditions 4.…”