An Impact Assessment of Beach Wrack and Litter on Beach Ecosystem Services to Support Coastal Management at the Baltic Sea

Abstract

As accumulation zones, sandy beaches are temporal sinks for beach wrack and litter, both often seen as nuisances to tourists. Consequently, there is a need for beach management and an enhanced political interest to evaluate their ecosystem services. We applied a new online multidisciplinary assessment approach differentiating between the provision, potential, and flow at German and Lithuanian beaches (Southern Baltic Sea). We selected a set of services and assessed four beach scenarios developed accordingly to common management measures (different beach wrack and litter accumulations). We conducted comparative assessments involving 39 external experts using spread-sheets and workshops, an online survey as well as a combined data-based approach. Results indicated the relative importance of cultural (52.2%), regulating and maintenance (37.4%), and provisioning services (10.4%). Assessed impact scores showed that the removal of beach wrack is not favorable with regard to the overall ecosystem service provision. Contrarily, the removal of litter can increase the service flow significantly. When removing beach wrack, synergies between services should be used, i.e., use of biomass as material or further processing. However, trade-offs prevail between cultural services and the overall provision of beach ecosystem services (i.e., coastal protection and biodiversity). We recommend developing new and innovative beach cleaning techniques and procedures, i.e., different spatio-temporal patterns, e.g., mechanical vs. manually, daily vs. on-demand, whole beach width vs. patches. Our fast and easy-to-apply assessment approach can support decision-making processes within sustainable coastal management allowing us to show and compare the impacts of measures from a holistic ecosystem services perspective.

Ecosystem Service Assessments within the EU Water Framework Directive: Marine Mussel Cultivation as a Controversial Measure

“…Several studies have already shown that ecosystem service assessments can support stakeholder communication and policy implementation [29,30]. In our case, it can serve as a tool to visualize potential benefits and trade-offs and analyze patterns and processes at a regional level [25,42,48].…”

“…While former studies gave first insights into the potential usage of ESA for the implementation of water quality improvement measures and their use within the integrated coastal management processes [25,39,48], they lacked concrete information about the application within the WFD implementation cycle itself. Based on our results and the experience we created, we see the following possible applications of ESA and PM in the selection and implementation of possible measures as exemplary for the German WFD implementation cycle (Figure 5).…”

Expert-Based Assessment and Mapping of Ecosystem Services Potential in the Nemunas Delta and Curonian Lagoon Region, Lithuania

“…The scale ranged from not important (1) to very important (5). Further, in this study, these values were transformed to 0, 1, 2, 4 and 8, respectively, and analyzed using the methodology presented in Robbe et al [30]. This non-linear transformation of the scores allowed the highlighting of the highest scoring value, thus having more robust and clear mapping results and a better understanding of the most important and valuable ES.…”

“…Results based on the flexible 0-5 ranking system and the linkage to geobiophysical spatial units (e.g., land cover, biotope, vegetation or soil types) in ES maps not only provide wide application ranges for decision-making, but also ensure that none of the ES are overlooked [26,27]. A more recent attempt to develop the matrix approach focused on ranking or assigning weights for ES categories [28][29][30], demonstrating that perceptions and priorities of well-being are area-and society-specific.…”

Identifying Ecosystem Service Trade-Offs and Their Response to Landscape Patterns at Different Scales in an Agricultural Basin in Central China

“…Intensive human activities have a significant impact on the relationships between ecosystem services [4,5] and overlooking ES trade-offs and synergies may lead to a reduction in the provisioning abilities of certain ESs and may even threaten ecosystem stability [6,7]. Identifying trade-offs and synergies between ESs and clarifying their spatiotemporal variations and driving factors are crucial for optimizing multiple services and avoiding damaging other services while improving a particular service [8,9]. It is of great significance to promote ESs from theoretical research to management practice.…”