Abstract
Earth's life-support systems are in rapid decline, yet we have few metrics or indicators with which to track these changes. The world's governments are calling for biodiversity and ecosystem-service monitoring to guide and evaluate international conservation policy as well as to incorporate natural capital into their national accounts. The Group on Earth Observations Biodiversity Observation Network (GEO BON) has been tasked with setting up this monitoring system. Here we explore the immediate feasibility of creating a global ecosystem-service monitoring platform under the GEO BON framework through combining data from national statistics, global vegetation models, and production function models. We found that nine ecosystem services could be annually reported at a national scale in the short term: carbon sequestration, water supply for hydropower, and non-fisheries marine products, crop, livestock, game meat, fisheries, mariculture, and timber production. Reported changes in service delivery over time reflected ecological shocks (e.g., droughts and disease outbreaks), highlighting the immediate utility of this monitoring system. Our work also identified three opportunities for creating a more comprehensive monitoring system. First, investing in input data for ecological process models (e.g., global land-use maps) would allow many more regulating services to be monitored. Currently, only 1 of 9 services that can be reported is a regulating service. Second, household surveys and censuses could help evaluate how nature affects people and provides non-monetary benefits. Finally, to forecast the sustainability of service delivery, research efforts could focus on calculating the total remaining biophysical stocks of provisioning services. Regardless, we demonstrated that a preliminary ecosystem-service monitoring platform is immediately feasible. With sufficient international investment, the platform could evolve further into a much-needed system to track changes in our planet's life-support systems.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 12-21 |
| Number of pages | 10 |
| Journal | Global Environmental Change |
| Volume | 35 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Nov 1 2015 |
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Keywords
- Ecosystem services
- GEO BON
- Global change
- Monitoring
- Process models
Cite this
National indicators for observing ecosystem service change. / Karp, Daniel S.; Tallis, Heather; Sachse, René; Halpern, Ben; Thonicke, Kirsten; Cramer, Wolfgang; Mooney, Harold; Polasky, Stephen; Tietjen, Britta; Waha, Katharina; Walz, Ariane; Wolny, Stacie.
In: Global Environmental Change, Vol. 35, 01.11.2015, p. 12-21.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article
}
TY - JOUR
T1 - National indicators for observing ecosystem service change
AU - Karp, Daniel S.
AU - Tallis, Heather
AU - Sachse, René
AU - Halpern, Ben
AU - Thonicke, Kirsten
AU - Cramer, Wolfgang
AU - Mooney, Harold
AU - Polasky, Stephen
AU - Tietjen, Britta
AU - Waha, Katharina
AU - Walz, Ariane
AU - Wolny, Stacie
PY - 2015/11/1
Y1 - 2015/11/1
N2 - Earth's life-support systems are in rapid decline, yet we have few metrics or indicators with which to track these changes. The world's governments are calling for biodiversity and ecosystem-service monitoring to guide and evaluate international conservation policy as well as to incorporate natural capital into their national accounts. The Group on Earth Observations Biodiversity Observation Network (GEO BON) has been tasked with setting up this monitoring system. Here we explore the immediate feasibility of creating a global ecosystem-service monitoring platform under the GEO BON framework through combining data from national statistics, global vegetation models, and production function models. We found that nine ecosystem services could be annually reported at a national scale in the short term: carbon sequestration, water supply for hydropower, and non-fisheries marine products, crop, livestock, game meat, fisheries, mariculture, and timber production. Reported changes in service delivery over time reflected ecological shocks (e.g., droughts and disease outbreaks), highlighting the immediate utility of this monitoring system. Our work also identified three opportunities for creating a more comprehensive monitoring system. First, investing in input data for ecological process models (e.g., global land-use maps) would allow many more regulating services to be monitored. Currently, only 1 of 9 services that can be reported is a regulating service. Second, household surveys and censuses could help evaluate how nature affects people and provides non-monetary benefits. Finally, to forecast the sustainability of service delivery, research efforts could focus on calculating the total remaining biophysical stocks of provisioning services. Regardless, we demonstrated that a preliminary ecosystem-service monitoring platform is immediately feasible. With sufficient international investment, the platform could evolve further into a much-needed system to track changes in our planet's life-support systems.
AB - Earth's life-support systems are in rapid decline, yet we have few metrics or indicators with which to track these changes. The world's governments are calling for biodiversity and ecosystem-service monitoring to guide and evaluate international conservation policy as well as to incorporate natural capital into their national accounts. The Group on Earth Observations Biodiversity Observation Network (GEO BON) has been tasked with setting up this monitoring system. Here we explore the immediate feasibility of creating a global ecosystem-service monitoring platform under the GEO BON framework through combining data from national statistics, global vegetation models, and production function models. We found that nine ecosystem services could be annually reported at a national scale in the short term: carbon sequestration, water supply for hydropower, and non-fisheries marine products, crop, livestock, game meat, fisheries, mariculture, and timber production. Reported changes in service delivery over time reflected ecological shocks (e.g., droughts and disease outbreaks), highlighting the immediate utility of this monitoring system. Our work also identified three opportunities for creating a more comprehensive monitoring system. First, investing in input data for ecological process models (e.g., global land-use maps) would allow many more regulating services to be monitored. Currently, only 1 of 9 services that can be reported is a regulating service. Second, household surveys and censuses could help evaluate how nature affects people and provides non-monetary benefits. Finally, to forecast the sustainability of service delivery, research efforts could focus on calculating the total remaining biophysical stocks of provisioning services. Regardless, we demonstrated that a preliminary ecosystem-service monitoring platform is immediately feasible. With sufficient international investment, the platform could evolve further into a much-needed system to track changes in our planet's life-support systems.
KW - Ecosystem services
KW - GEO BON
KW - Global change
KW - Monitoring
KW - Process models
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84940055529&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84940055529&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2015.07.014
DO - 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2015.07.014
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84940055529
VL - 35
SP - 12
EP - 21
JO - Global Environmental Change
JF - Global Environmental Change
SN - 0959-3780
ER -