Multicriteria spatial analysis applied to identifying ecosystem services in mixed-use river catchment areas in south central Chile

Abstract

Background: The flow of goods and services occurring in catchment areas allows the production of a series of ecosystem services. These have a direct impact on the inhabitants of the territory, who in turn recognise and value ecosystems (social value) as a function of the benefits which they generate. This has a direct impact on public policies that contribute to the development of local economies. The present study therefore sought to identify and recognize the social value of the various ecosystem services provided by a mixed-use catchment area in which different productive activities are concentrated. This study examined the social value of ecosystem services and offers qualitative or quantitative, non-monetary estimates of the relative importance of different benefits for human society derived from the functioning of ecosystems (Laterra et al, Valoración de Servicios Ecosistémicos, Conceptos, herramientas y aplicaciones para el ordenamiento territorial, 2011). The methodology involved the participation of leading actors in the territory, and a panel of experts who defined criteria and weighting which were applied to a multicriteria spatial model. They assigned ordinal scale to the territory representing levels of appreciation based on the various ecosystem services in the ecological, productive, landscape and cultural dimensions. The results showed that the inhabitants of the territory recognise the ecosystem benefit of areas covered by native forest, in particular the species Nothofagus dombeyi (Mirb.) Oerst., in contrast to areas used for farm production. The functioning of the ecosystem is recognised, and particularly its contribution to regulating water flows and to water production and quality. Results: The study results showed that areas covered with secondary forest of N. dombeyi provide a variety of ecosystem functions which support the creation of ecosystem services to the population, especially in riparian areas throughout the basin where they are important for water production and quality. ES ponderations for provision, regulation and cultural showed that the native forest and riparian units (HEU 1 and HEU 6) as a very important group in relation to the ES because there are recognized by the local society (P < 0.05). The leading actors assigned a low social value to other landuses, like mixed use and farmland, because of the high degree of anthropisation of these ecosystems; this viewpoint has generated conflicts in the territory. Neither foresters nor farmers recognise or accept the impacts of their activities on the various ecosystem services provided by the territories where they operate, even though they are leading actors for the development of local economies.

Complementary use of the Ecosystem Service Concept and Multi-criteria Decision Analysis in Water Management

“…There were, for example, large differences in what ES categories and criteria were used in MCDA. MEA was used as a framework in most of the older cases, but the CICES was also used especially among the newest cases (e.g., Comin et al 2018;Esse et al 2019;Saarikoski et al 2019). From the terminology used in several decision hierarchies it can, however, be inferred that the ES concept has been utilized in the background, even if their upper level categories were not used.…”

Social benefits of river restoration from ecosystem services perspective: A systematic review

“…The social benefits of river restoration from an ES perspective need to be more fully developed to understand their influence from a wider perspective. For example, the participation of actors in the regional level can contribute to defining public policies for sustainable management and conservation of ecosystems (Esse et al, 2019). Future research could focus on: (i) identifying those actors who enjoy the benefits directly or indirectly; and (ii) including their opinions, perspectives and validations when identifying the benefits.…”

“…The existing published scientific articles on the topic have primarily concentrated on: (i) river restoration concepts and definitions (Wohl et al, 2005); (ii) focus and methods of assessing river restoration (Gilby et al 2019, Makwinja et al 2019; and (iii) linkage of ecosystem services to monitor river restoration (Colloff et al, 2019;Esse et al, 2019). This paper complements these works by conducting a systematic review with a focus on the social benefits of river restoration and associating ecosystem services with it.…”

Afectación de los servicios ecosistémicos hídricos en la cuenca del río Teatinos (páramo Rabanal) efecto del cambio de coberturas de la tierra – producto del cambio climático global

“…La dificultad en evaluar este impacto consiste en que en las zonas del país, y, más que todo en las zonas de páramos, la red de monitoreo hidrometeorológico es escasa y, a veces, es ausente [13]. No obstante, el acercamiento a estas evaluaciones es necesario es importante porque el 70 % de cuencas abastecedoras en Colombia nacen en los páramos y diferentes usos del agua [14], así como la conservación de integridad ecológica [15,16], dependen del servicio de provisión y regulación hídrica.…”