scholarly journals Ecosystem Services at the Archipelago Sea Biosphere Reserve in Finland: A Visitor Perspective

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 421 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elina Viirret ◽  
Kaisa Raatikainen ◽  
Nora Fagerholm ◽  
Niina Käyhkö ◽  
Petteri Vihervaara
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Leisure Activities ◽  
Biosphere Reserve ◽  
Land Uses ◽  
Cultural Perspective ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Biosphere Reserves ◽  
Local Livelihoods ◽  
Archipelago Sea ◽  
Sustainable Landscapes

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO’s) Biosphere Reserves aim to be flagships of sustainable landscapes. Many of them are important locations for tourism and leisure activities. We explored the perceptions of short-term visitors and summer residents on ecosystem services (ESs) tied to characteristic habitats of the Archipelago Sea Biosphere Reserve in Finland. During holiday season, we conducted structured on-field interviews with 74 Biosphere Reserve visitors. From these data, we gained information on the visitors’ appreciation of different ESs and the selected habitats. We also derived habitat-specific ES profiles. Excluding the reedbeds, most habitats were both highly valued and considered as important producers of the listed ESs. The derived ES profiles were partially overlapping and inclined towards appreciation of cultural services, and the importance of scenery was highlighted. Provisioning services were not particularly appreciated. We discovered several linkages among biodiversity, ESs, and recreational land uses. Certain habitats were found to be in need of protection under high recreational land-use pressure, but also potential synergies were found. Our method introduces an important socio-cultural perspective into the region’s land management that aims to find a balance between the protection of the Biosphere Reserve’s unique biodiversity and the need to support sustainable local livelihoods and tourism.

scholarly journals Biosphere Reserves - Suggested Model of the Institution of Commons (Case study of the Šumava Biosphere Reserve)

2010 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 73-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Těšitel ◽  
Drahomíra Kušová
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Cultural Landscape ◽  
Biosphere Reserve ◽  
Landscape Scale ◽  
Theoretical Concept ◽  
Suggested Model ◽  
Natural Ecosystems ◽  
Nature Protection ◽  
Biosphere Reserves

Biosphere Reserves - Suggested Model of the Institution of Commons (Case study of the Šumava Biosphere Reserve)An attempt to address the interdependence between human economies and natural ecosystems has been articulated in ecological economics, among others, in terms of ecosystem services. Introducing ecosystem services yields positive result in the sense that the theoretical concept of cultural landscape has been complemented by the more or less effective political scheme, suitable as a basis for practical decision making. Nevertheless, practical management of ecosystem services on landscape scale is a rather complex task. The concept ofinstitution of commonscould be suggested to be used when dealing with the problem of implementation of ecosystem services concept in practice. The overall aim of the contribution is to discuss whether or not, or to which extent,UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, the modern strategy in biodiversity conservation backed up by internationally agreed upon conventions, can be used as a model for institution of commons in landscape-scale nature protection. The discussion is based on empirical evidence gained within a long-term research conducted in the Šumava Biosphere Reserve, Czech Republic.

scholarly journals GIS and land cover-based assessment of ecosystem services in the North Karelia Biosphere Reserve, Finland

2019 ◽  
Vol 197 (2) ◽  
pp. 249-267 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Poikolainen ◽  
Guilherme Pinto ◽  
Petteri Vihervaara ◽  
Benjamin Burkhard ◽  
Franzeska Wolff ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Land Use Planning ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Sustainable Use ◽  
High Capacity ◽  
Biosphere Reserve ◽  
Sustainable Land Use ◽  
Biosphere Reserves ◽  
The North ◽  
Promising Tool

Conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity, ecosystems and their services are key principles behind the establishment of “Biosphere Reserves”. Mapping of ecosystem services is one of the activities that is expected to increase the knowledge of sustainable land use planning. The Biosphere Reserves, established by the UNESCO Man and Biosphere Programme, aims to find the balance between nature conservation, use of natural resources, recreation and other culture-related activities. For this purpose, the ecosystem services approach is a promising tool for examining the relationships between people and nature in practice. This study applies the ecosystem services approach and examines which ecosystem services are perceived to be relevant in the North Karelia Biosphere Reserve in Eastern Finland. The results of a matrix method, with expert-based approach, showed that particularly old-growth forests and undrained open and forested mires have a broader potential to provide different ecosystem services. Water and urban areas are considered important for cultural services. However, these areas cover only a relatively small area altogether. The results of the ecosystem services assessment were compared to areas of high biodiversity, as defined by local biodiversity experts. The areas with high capacity for ecosystem services provision (from now on “high ecosystem services areas”) were found in areas with high biodiversity. In most cases, these areas are already under protection. The results also showed that ambiguity is an issue with the use of the ecosystem services concept in both stakeholder and expert evaluations.

scholarly journals The Effects of Biotic and Abiotic Factors on the Community Dynamics in a Mountain Subtropical Forest

Forests ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 427
Author(s):  
Tianyang Zhou ◽  
Jiaxin Zhang ◽  
Yunzhi Qin ◽  
Mingxi Jiang ◽  
Xiujuan Qiao
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Forest Dynamics ◽  
Community Dynamics ◽  
Abiotic Factors ◽  
Subtropical Forest ◽  
Above Ground Biomass ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Forest Ecosystem Services ◽  
Number Of Individuals

From supporting wood production to mitigating climate change, forest ecosystem services are crucial to the well-being of humans. Understanding the mechanisms that drive forest dynamics can help us infer how to maintain forest ecosystem services and how to improve predictions of forest dynamics under climate change. Despite the growing number of studies exploring above ground biomass (AGB) dynamics, questions of dynamics in biodiversity and in number of individuals still remain unclear. Here, we first explored the patterns of community dynamics in different aspects (i.e., AGB, density and biodiversity) based on short-term (five years) data from a 25-ha permanent plot in a subtropical forest in central China. Second, we examined the relationships between community dynamics and biodiversity and functional traits. Third, we identified the key factors affecting different aspects of community dynamics and quantified their relative contributions. We found that in the short term (five years), net above ground biomass change (ΔAGB) and biodiversity increased, while the number of individuals decreased. Resource-conservation traits enhanced the ΔAGB and reduced the loss in individuals, while the resource-acquisition traits had the opposite effect. Furthermore, the community structure contributed the most to ΔAGB; topographic variables and soil nutrients contributed the most to the number of individuals; demographic process contributed the most to biodiversity. Our results indicate that biotic factors mostly affected the community dynamics of ΔAGB and biodiversity, while the number of individuals was mainly shaped by abiotic factors. Our work highlighted that the factors influencing different aspects of community dynamics vary. Therefore, forest management practices should be formulated according to a specific protective purpose.

Economic valuation and the commodification of ecosystem services

2011 ◽  
Vol 35 (5) ◽  
pp. 613-628 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erik Gómez-Baggethun ◽  
Manuel Ruiz-Pérez
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Environmental Policy ◽  
Biodiversity Conservation ◽  
Economic Valuation ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Valuation Of Ecosystem Services ◽  
Equity Of Access ◽  
The Way

In the last decade a growing number of environmental scientists have advocated economic valuation of ecosystem services as a pragmatic short-term strategy to communicate the value of biodiversity in a language that reflects dominant political and economic views. This paper revisits the controversy on economic valuation of ecosystem services in the light of two aspects that are often neglected in ongoing debates. First, the role of the particular institutional setup in which environmental policy and governance is currently embedded in shaping valuation outcomes. Second, the broader economic and sociopolitical processes that have governed the expansion of pricing into previously non-marketed areas of the environment. Our analysis suggests that within the institutional setup and broader sociopolitical processes that have become prominent since the late 1980s economic valuation is likely to pave the way for the commodification of ecosystem services with potentially counterproductive effects in the long term for biodiversity conservation and equity of access to ecosystem services benefits.

Evaluating the Ecosystem Service Benefits of Native Vegetation Management at Solar Energy Facilities

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leroy Walston ◽  
Heidi Hartmann
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Solar Energy ◽  
National Laboratory ◽  
Argonne National Laboratory ◽  
Vegetation Management ◽  
Energy Development ◽  
Department Of Energy ◽  
Land Uses ◽  
Solar Pv ◽  
Pollination Services

<p>Concomitant with the increase in solar photovoltaic (PV) energy development over the past decade has been the increasing emphasis on land sharing strategies that maximize the land use efficiency of solar energy developments.  Many of these strategies focus on improving the compatibility of solar energy development with other co-located land uses (e.g., agriculture) and by improving several ecosystem services that could have natural, societal, and industrial benefits. One such land opportunity is the restoration and management of native grassland vegetation beneath ground-mounted PV solar energy facilities, which has the potential to restore native habitat to conserve biodiversity and restore previously altered ecosystem services (e.g., natural pollination services). This presentation will discuss various assessment and modeling approaches to evaluate the scale and magnitude of the ecosystem services provided by different vegetation management strategies at solar PV energy development sites. This work demonstrates how multifunctional land uses in energy systems represents a win-win solution for energy and the environment by optimizing energy-food-ecology synergies. This work was conducted by Argonne National Laboratory for the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Energy Technologies Office under Contract No. DE-AC02-06CH11357.</p>

scholarly journals Short-term responses of native bees to livestock and implications for managing ecosystem services in grasslands

Ecosphere ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 3 (10) ◽  
pp. art88 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chiho Kimoto ◽  
Sandra J. DeBano ◽  
Robbin W. Thorp ◽  
Robert V. Taylor ◽  
Heidi Schmalz ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Native Bees ◽  
Short Term
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