The value of the world's ecosystem services and natural capital

Costanza, Robert; d’Arge, Ralph C.; Groot, R.S. de; Färber, Stephen; Grasso, Monica; Hannon, Bruce; Limburg, Karin E.; Naeem, Shahid; O’Neill, Robert V.; Paruelo, José M.; Raskin, R.; Sutton, Paul; Belt, Marjan van den

doi:10.1016/s0921-8009(98)00020-2

Cited by 3,289 publications

(3,689 citation statements)

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“…We humans are also dependent on the various life-supporting functions of ecosystems. Indeed, the capability of degraded ecosystems to sustain ecosystem services like food production, maintenance of freshwater and forest resources, regulation of climate and air quality, and amelioration of infectious diseases has been questioned (Costanza et al 1997, Millennium Ecosystem Assessment 2005. Ecological restoration was added to the toolbox of conservation a couple of decades ago in order to respond to the threats of environmental degradation .…”

Section: Ecological Restorationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fighting carbon loss of degraded peatlands by jump-starting ecosystem functioning with ecological restoration

Kareksela

Haapalehto

Juutinen

et al. 2015

Science of The Total Environment

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Esitetään Jyväskylän yliopiston matemaattis-luonnontieteellisen tiedekunnan suostumuksella julkisesti tarkastettavaksi yliopiston vanhassa juhlasalissa S212 maaliskuun 28. päivänä 2014 kello 12.Academic dissertation to be publicly discussed, by permission of the Faculty of Mathematics and Science of the University of Jyväskylä, in building Seminarium, auditorium S212, on March 28, 2014 at 12 o'clock noon. The wide and rapidly increasing human land use has caused extensive degradation of natural landscapes, extinctions of species and loss of ecosystem functions and services. Subsequently, ecological restoration has been raised to a major global strategy for safeguarding ecosystem values. However, concerns have been raised on the real potential of restoration to re-establish ecosystem structures and functions. Here, I studied the effects of ecological restoration on the structure and functions of forestry drained boreal peatland ecosystems in southern Finland. To better understand structural and functional changes, the effects of drainage and restoration on water table level, pore water chemistry and peat chemistry were explored as well. Drainage lowered the water table and induced changes in pore water chemistry and plant community composition. Drainage retarded the accumulation of surface peat and resulted in significant reduction in the sequestration of carbon therein. Re-establishment of water table level and significant recovery of pore water and surface peat chemistry were observed after restoration. Restoration induced the recovery of ecosystem structure i.e. plant community composition towards the target. The recovery was dependent on the within-site degree of ecosystem degradation. The original ecosystem structure was not needed for the re-establishment of important peatland ecosystem functionality in terms of surface peat accumulation. However, a more profound recovery of structure and conditions may be needed for some other functions like surface peat carbon sequestration to recover. Overall, my results are promising from the perspective of restoration. However, they highlight the need for patience in drawing conclusions on the effectiveness of restoration. Practitioners should also be prepared for temporarily increased leaching of nutrients into downstream water courses. UNIVERSITY

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Section: Ecological Restorationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fighting carbon loss of degraded peatlands by jump-starting ecosystem functioning with ecological restoration

Kareksela

Haapalehto

Juutinen

et al. 2015

Science of The Total Environment

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“…Ecosystem services are critical to the functioning of coastal systems and contribute significantly to human well-being, representing a considerable portion of the total economic value of the coastal environment. Coastal systems cover only 6.3% of the world's surface, but are responsible for 43% of the estimated value of the world's ecosystem services (Costanza et al 1997). It follows that the loss of coastal and open ocean ecosystems, which is occurring throughout the world, represents a major loss to the world's and to individual coastal nations' natural capital (Craig 2007).…”

Section: Problems and Needs: Major Impacts In Chilean Fjord Ecosystemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Patagonian Fjord Ecosystems in Southern Chile as a Highly Vulnerable Region: Problems and Needs

Iriarte

González

Nahuelhual

2010

AMBIO

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Southern Chile encompasses one of the most extensive fjord regions of the world, the Patagonia, currently exposed to natural and anthropogenic perturbations. These fjord ecosystems provide important services to humans, which have not been adequately measured and valued. As a consequence, ecosystem services are commonly ignored in public policy design and in the evaluation of development projects. Here we tackle questions that are highly relevant for the nation's development, namely (1) understanding fjord functioning, and (2) developing management strategies based on ecosystem services, in order to secure simultaneous and adequate use of these ecosystems which area influenced by ecological (e.g., biogeochemical) and productive (e.g., aquaculture, fisheries) processes. We also seek to strengthen the analysis of fjord ecosystem value from the economical (including coastal zoning), socio-cultural, institutional, and governmental points of view. In addition, the investigation of current and future effects of climate change on this large region offers a unique opportunity to understand the social and economic consequences of a global phenomenon at local to regional scales. Biogeochemical and socio-economic models will be used to simulate future scenarios under a gamut of management options.

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“…Ecosystems provide a multitude of services that are of fundamental significance to humans' well-being, livelihood, health and survival (Costanza et al, 1997(Costanza et al, , 2014Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005;TEEB, 2010a, b). The importance of these services has stimulated considerable interest in their conservation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The importance of these services has stimulated considerable interest in their conservation. After the seminal work of Costanza et al (1997), the body of research on methods of estimating, mapping, and quantifying ecosystem services has grown exponentially (Fisher et al, 2009), particularly since the release of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA; de Groot et al, 2010Groot et al, , 2012, an international study involving over 1300 scientists. The MA provided important evidence of the ongoing degradation of approximately 60% of the world's ecosystems over the past five decades (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring spatiotemporal changes in ecosystem-service values and hotspots in China

Fang

Wang

2016

Science of The Total Environment

146

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Although ecosystems are valuable, they have been allowed to deteriorate globally in recent decades. However, the spatiotemporal changes in ecosystem-service values (ESVs) and their hotspots in China are not well understood. Here, long-term land-cover data, the spatial analysis method and an econometric analysis model were used to examine these changes. The results indicate that the total terrestrial ESV decreased from US$2398.31 billion in 1990 to US$2347.56 billion in 2010 (converted to 2009 dollar values), which provides strong evidence for the tendency of ecosystems in China to deteriorate over time, albeit slightly. We also found that the changes in ESVs had significant spatial heterogeneity. Our analysis showed that the relationship between ESV and gross domestic product (GDP) is generally negative, but this relationship is not always fixed. The Loess Plateau, Guizhou, Hubei, Henan and Xinjiang continually presented concentrated hotspot areas of ESV changes, whereas coastal regions continually presented concentrated cold-spot areas. Overlap analyses and logistic regressions demonstrate that national ecological programs have clear effects on the improvement of ecosystems but that the effectiveness of different policies varies on spatial and temporal scales. The results of this study will support more effective decision-making around the implementation of ecological conservation policies.

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The value of the world's ecosystem services and natural capital

Cited by 3,289 publications

References 20 publications

Fighting carbon loss of degraded peatlands by jump-starting ecosystem functioning with ecological restoration

Fighting carbon loss of degraded peatlands by jump-starting ecosystem functioning with ecological restoration

Patagonian Fjord Ecosystems in Southern Chile as a Highly Vulnerable Region: Problems and Needs

Exploring spatiotemporal changes in ecosystem-service values and hotspots in China

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