Conceptualizing ecosystem services using social–ecological networks

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
María R. Felipe-Lucia ◽  
Angela M. Guerrero ◽  
Steven M. Alexander ◽  
Jaime Ashander ◽  
Jacopo A. Baggio ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Ecological Networks ◽  
Social Ecological

scholarly journals “A Very Noble Crop”: Financial Stability, Agronomic Expertise, and Personal Values Support Conservation in Shade-Grown Coffee Farms

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (13) ◽  
pp. 7227
Author(s):  
Jeannine H. Richards ◽  
Ingrid M. Torrez Luna ◽  
Alberto Vargas
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Financial Stability ◽  
Personal Values ◽  
Nutrient Cycles ◽  
Tropical Biodiversity ◽  
Social Ecological ◽  
Positive Attitudes ◽  
Building Conservation ◽  
Aesthetic Values ◽  
Conservation Interventions

Shade-grown coffee is an important reservoir for tropical biodiversity, but habitat quality hinges on decisions made by farmers. Our research aims to investigate the link between coffee producers’ decisions and outcomes for biodiversity, using epiphytes as our focal group. Using qualitative methods, we interviewed 33 producers in northern Nicaragua to understand how they connect trees and epiphytes on their farms to ecosystem services and how personal values, access to agronomic expertise, labor supply, and financial stability influence decision-making. We used interview responses to construct six producer typologies. Most producers had strong positive attitudes toward trees and associated them with a variety of important ecosystem services. Smallholders were more likely to connect trees with provisioning services, while producers on larger farms and with greater agronomic knowledge emphasized regulating services. Most producers connected epiphytes primarily with aesthetic values. Across demographics, producers emphasized the restorative potential for shade coffee in repairing damage to soil, water, and nutrient cycles caused by other forms of agriculture. The conservation significance and sustainability of this social-ecological system can be maintained and expanded through economic and capacity-building conservation interventions, especially when those can be connected to values already held by farmers.

Multi-level social-ecological networks in a payments for ecosystem services programme in central Veracruz, Mexico

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-7
Author(s):  
Alfonso Langle-Flores ◽  
Adriana Aguilar Rodríguez ◽  
Humberto Romero-Uribe ◽  
Julia Ros-Cuéllar ◽  
Juan José Von Thaden
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Payments For Ecosystem Services ◽  
Collaboration Network ◽  
Governmental Organizations ◽  
Social Ecological ◽  
Non Governmental Organizations ◽  
Conservation Activity ◽  
Ecological Importance ◽  
Hydrological Services

Summary Payments for ecosystem services (PES) programmes have been considered an important conservation mechanism to avoid deforestation. These environmental policies act in social and ecological contexts at different spatial scales. We evaluated the social-ecological fit between stakeholders and ecosystem processes in a local PES programme across three levels: social, ecological and social-ecological. We explored collaboration among stakeholders, assessed connectivity between forest units and evaluated conservation activity links between stakeholders and forest units. In addition, to increase programme effectiveness, we classified forest units based on their social and ecological importance. Our main findings suggest that non-governmental organizations occupy brokerage positions between landowners and government in a dense collaboration network. We also found a partial spatial misfit between conservation activity links and the forest units that provide the most hydrological services to Xalapa. We conclude that conservation efforts should be directed towards the middle and high part of the Pixquiac sub-watershed and that the role of non-governmental organizations as mediators should be strengthened to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the local PES programme.

Cascading social-ecological costs and benefits triggered by a recovering keystone predator

Science ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 368 (6496) ◽  
pp. 1243-1247 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edward J. Gregr ◽  
Villy Christensen ◽  
Linda Nichol ◽  
Rebecca G. Martone ◽  
Russell W. Markel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Grazing Pressure ◽  
Economic Consequences ◽  
Ecosystem Change ◽  
Kelp Forests ◽  
Sea Otter ◽  
Sea Otters ◽  
Ecological Benefits ◽  
Social Ecological ◽  
Keystone Predators

Predator recovery often leads to ecosystem change that can trigger conflicts with more recently established human activities. In the eastern North Pacific, recovering sea otters are transforming coastal systems by reducing populations of benthic invertebrates and releasing kelp forests from grazing pressure. These changes threaten established shellfish fisheries and modify a variety of other ecosystem services. The diverse social and economic consequences of this trophic cascade are unknown, particularly across large regions. We developed and applied a trophic model to predict these impacts on four ecosystem services. Results suggest that sea otter presence yields 37% more total ecosystem biomass annually, increasing the value of finfish [+9.4 million Canadian dollars (CA$)], carbon sequestration (+2.2 million CA$), and ecotourism (+42.0 million CA$). To the extent that these benefits are realized, they will exceed the annual loss to invertebrate fisheries (−$7.3 million CA$). Recovery of keystone predators thus not only restores ecosystems but can also affect a range of social, economic, and ecological benefits for associated communities.

scholarly journals Social Learning for Facilitating Dialogue and Understanding of the Ecosystem Services Approach: Lessons from a Cross-Border Experience in the Alboran Marine Basin

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (19) ◽  
pp. 5239 ◽  
Author(s):  
María D. López-Rodríguez ◽  
Javier Cabello ◽  
Hermelindo Castro ◽  
Jaime Rodríguez
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Social Learning ◽  
Social Transformation ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Ecological System ◽  
Social Ecological ◽  
The Social ◽  
Governance Practice ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Marine Basin

Social learning (SL) appears to have considerable potential to enhance the impact of the ecosystem services approach (ESA) discourse on policy and society. However, empirical research to better understand the processes that support SL, the effects it generates, and the conditions that enable such learning is limited. This study assesses the ability of SL to enhance dialogue and understanding of the ESA to support transformative social change in governance practice in the Alboran Marine Basin. To do so, we conducted a specifically designed SL process oriented towards the ESA as a governance approach in this marine region. The SL process was developed through three interlinked workshops involving scientists, decision-makers and local users from Spain and Morocco, the two countries that share the governance of this social-ecological system. The results revealed that the SL process progressively facilitated (i) a more inclusive and constructive ecosystem services dialogue, (ii) a better understanding of the social-ecological system in which the actors were embedded, (iii) an enhanced recognition of science-policy-society complementarities to address sustainability issues, and (iv) a gradual social transformation towards more sustainable and equitable governance. Via the SL process, a variety of factors were identified as contributing to the creation of four relevant conditions that facilitated its successful operationalisation. These conditions included (i) the generation of trust and shared understanding, (ii) the facilitation of knowledge exchanges between actor groups across frontiers, (iii) the promotion of more democratic participation, and (iv) the co-production of practical outcomes. These contextual insights provided empirical evidence of the prominent role SL can play to enhance dialogue and understanding of the ESA for supporting its adoption as governance practice. On this basis, it is argued that operationalising SL in those processes focused on making the ESA relevant to policy and society is pivotal to its implementation in governance practice.

scholarly journals Enabling Green and Blue Infrastructure to Improve Contributions to Human Well-Being and Equity in Urban Systems

BioScience ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 69 (7) ◽  
pp. 566-574 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erik Andersson ◽  
Johannes Langemeyer ◽  
Sara Borgström ◽  
Timon McPhearson ◽  
Dagmar Haase ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Ecosystem Service ◽  
Rapid Change ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Urban Systems ◽  
Dynamic Interactions ◽  
Technological Factors ◽  
Social Ecological ◽  
Variable Distribution

AbstractThe circumstances under which different ecosystem service benefits can be realized differ. The benefits tend to be coproduced and to be enabled by multiple interacting social, ecological, and technological factors, which is particularly evident in cities. As many cities are undergoing rapid change, these factors need to be better understood and accounted for, especially for those most in need of benefits. We propose a framework of three systemic filters that affect the flow of ecosystem service benefits: the interactions among green, blue, and built infrastructures; the regulatory power and governance of institutions; and people's individual and shared perceptions and values. We argue that more fully connecting green and blue infrastructure to its urban systems context and highlighting dynamic interactions among the three filters are key to understanding how and why ecosystem services have variable distribution, continuing inequities in who benefits, and the long-term resilience of the flows of benefits.

scholarly journals Delayed behavioural shifts undermine the sustainability of social–ecological systems

2017 ◽  
Vol 284 (1868) ◽  
pp. 20171192 ◽  
Author(s):  
A.-S. Lafuite ◽  
C. de Mazancourt ◽  
M. Loreau
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Natural Habitat ◽  
Sustainable Consumption ◽  
Ecological Systems ◽  
Habitat Destruction ◽  
Social Ecological Systems ◽  
Social Ecological ◽  
Ecological Feedbacks ◽  
Mixed Equilibria

Natural habitat destruction and fragmentation generate a time-delayed loss of species and associated ecosystem services. As social–ecological systems (SESs) depend on a range of ecosystem services, lagged ecological dynamics may affect their long-term sustainability. Here, we investigate the role of consumption changes for sustainability, under a time-delayed ecological feedback on agricultural production. We use a stylized model that couples the dynamics of biodiversity, technology, human demography and compliance with a social norm prescribing sustainable consumption. Compliance with the sustainable norm reduces both the consumption footprint and the vulnerability of SESs to transient overshoot-and-collapse population crises. We show that the timing and interaction between social, demographic and ecological feedbacks govern the transient and long-term dynamics of the system. A sufficient level of social pressure (e.g. disapproval) applied on the unsustainable consumers leads to the stable coexistence of unsustainable and sustainable or mixed equilibria, where both defectors and conformers coexist. Under bistability conditions, increasing extinction debts reduces the resilience of the system, thus favouring abrupt regime shifts towards unsustainable pathways. Given recent evidence of large extinction debts, such results call for farsightedness and a better understanding of time delays when studying the sustainability of coupled SESs.

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