Defining ecosystem services and designing mechanisms for their conservation

Background/Question/Methods

Interest in ecosystem services is growing rapidly among government agencies, conservation organiza­tions, develop­ment donors, and ecologists. This concept has the potential to contribute something new to sustainable economic development and to the conservation of nature and biodiversity. There is, however, considerable confusion about the concept of eco­system services, and there is a real danger that this confusion could impede the development of effective incentives and mechanisms for conserving them. An analysis of the history of the concept of ecosystem services, and of their ecological, economic, and governance characteristics, was used to create a framework for designing mechanisms to conserve them.

Results/Conclusions

A review of the history of the concept of ecosystem services showed that it was first used more than 40 years ago to refer to benefits that humans receive from ecological processes and functions. This is the definition that is used in the ESA’s Ecosystem Services Fact Sheet http://www.esa.org/ecoservices/ . The original definition is much more focused than that used by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005).  

There are three relatively distinct types of benefits from nature: ecosystem services, ecosystem products, and non-material benefits.  Ecosystem services are system-level properties of ecosystems, not properties of individual species.  Ecosystem products are generally benefits from individual species. Non-material benefits derive from human aesthetic, spiritual, educational, recreational, and other values, not ecological characteristics in a direct way.

The analysis concluded that the three ecologically-distinct types of benefits from nature also have relatively distinct economic and governance characteristics, and that it is important to understand and distinguish those in crafting policies for the conservation and sustainable management of each type of benefit. An analytical framework that distinguishes the unique ecological, economic, and governance characteristics of ecosystem services can help to develop practical mechanisms for their conservation. The analysis also concluded that ecologists need to communicate to decision makers and the public that biodiversity is the source of ecosystem services – it is not itself an ecosystem service.