Stakeholder perspectives on ecosystem service supply and ecosystem service demand bundles

Recent developments in Ecosystem Service (ES) research show a growing interest in the concept of ES bundles for informing the effective management of landscapes. While the supply of ES bundles was biophysically assessed, there has been little research about the perception of ES bundles, neither in terms of their supply, nor of their demand. This research investigates how various stakeholders perceive the delivery of ES supply bundles across different landscapes and how this differs from the ES demand bundles they request. A questionnaire survey (n = 858) was carried out on the basis of landscape photographs with local farmers, local inhabitants, and visitors in the region of South Tyrol in the Central Alps. The results show that the different stakeholder groups identify identical ES supply bundles (i.e. experiential service, life maintenance service, agroservice bundle) and associate each with a similar set of landscape types. Stakeholders, however, differ in terms of their expressed demand for ES bundles. These findings suggest that stakeholders experience different (spatial) mismatches between the supply and demand of ES, potentially leading to stakeholder conflicts in landscape management. This study concludes by discussing these potential conflicts across different landscapes and in the context of future land use and management decisions

A bird’s eye view over ecosystem services in Natura 2000 sites across Europe

Recent ‘New Conservation’ approaches called for more ecosystem services (ES) emphasis in conservation. We analysed data from 3757 Natura 2000 special protection areas (SPAs) and translated positive and negative impacts listed by conservation managers into indicators of the use of nine provisioning, regulating and cultural ES. Overall, the use of ES is considered by SPA managers to affect conservation goals more negatively than positively. ES associated with livestock keeping and fodder production are recorded as having the highest fraction of positive impacts on SPAs, ranging from 88% and 78% in the Boreal biogeographic region to 20% and 6% in the Mediterranean. The use of ES varied according to dominant habitat class, highlighting the dependence of specific ES on associated ecosystem functions. For instance, fibre production was the predominant ES throughout forest habitats while crop, fodder and livestock exhibit similar patterns of dominance across agricultural landscapes. In contrast, the use of wild food and recreation activities are seen as causing mainly negative effects across all habitats. Our analysis suggests that most uses of ES result in negative effects on conservation goals. These outcomes should be considered when implementing future conservation strategies

Ordering 'wilderness': Variations in public representations of wilderness and their spatial distributions

Wilderness has recently re-emerged as a key landscape quality in the public debate in Europe, experiencing renewed appreciation in terms of tourism and nature conservation. At the same time, wilderness has turned into a critical matter of conflict, calling for a better understanding of the public’s varied views on wilderness and the spatial localisation of areas of potential conflict. In this paper, we explore the plurality of existing public wilderness representations combining qualitative evidence from 21 semi-structured interviews with quantitative data from a large-scale questionnaire survey (n = 858) conducted in the region of South Tyrol in the Central Alps. This is complemented with a GIS-based approach to quantify and map the geographic coverage of the different representations of wilderness. Our study reveals three distinct public wilderness representations, i.e. ‘Area with no human impact’, ‘Remote and large area’, and ‘Area where nature can self-develop’, differing in terms of selection and weighting of wilderness attributes. The translation of wilderness representations into maps shows clear differences in spatial distribution, location, and extent of areas with high wilderness quality across the three representations. We further demonstrate the added value of our approach by comparing the results with a standardised, expert-based approach on wilderness quality mapping, finding that the extent of areas of high wilderness quality significantly varies depending on whether the mapping is based on experts' or public's representation of wilderness. We therefore conclude that recognising public wilderness representations and their plurality is fundamental for identifying areas of potential conflict and sustainably managing wild landscapes

Integrated Assessment and Modelling of the Spatially Explicit Perceptions of Social Demands for Ecosystem Services

International audienceIn the context of global environmental changes, the endeavours to reach both natural and social sustainability become more and more debated. Speaking of regional development and realization of economic intentions, the impact on the biodiversity must be considered. The local communities, however, might disregard some interventions that affect the environment when trying to reach better socioeconomic status. In this paper, we intend to explore the social demands for ecosystem services in terms of the construction of an open-pit mining project in the semi-arid Southern Arizona. By conducting qualitative assessment via survey-based investigation, we couple the preferences of the ecosystem services beneficiaries (ESBs)-local environmentalists and local residents, with natural-based parameters. The research outcomes help to identify the most important ecosystem services reliant on water resources. The generated supply/demand maps reveal a spatial understanding on the ecosystem services in regards to the hypothetical judgements of the involved participants (ecosystem services beneficiaries). In addition, the importance and the application of the ecosystem services concept in nature-based solutions are highlighted