Applying the ecosystem services framework to pasture-based livestock farming systems in Europe

Abstract

The concept of 'Ecosystem Services' (ES) focuses on the linkages between ecosystems, including agroecosystems, and human well-being, referring to all the benefits, direct and indirect, that people obtain from ecosystems. In this paper, we review the application of the ES framework to pasture-based livestock farming systems, which allows (1) regulating, supporting and cultural ES to be integrated at the same level with provisioning ES, and (2) the multiple trade-offs and synergies that exist among ES to be considered. Research on livestock farming has focused mostly on provisioning ES (meat, milk and fibre production), despite the fact that provisioning ES strongly depends on regulating and supporting ES for their existence. We first present an inventory of the non-provisioning ES (regulating, supporting and cultural) provided by pasture-based livestock systems in Europe. Next, we review the trade-offs between provisioning and non-provisioning ES at multiple scales and present an overview of the methodologies for assessing biophysical trade-offs. Third, we present non-biophysical (economical and socio-cultural) methodologies and applications for ES valuation. We conclude with some recommendations for policy design.

Cultural and territorial vitality services play a key role in livestock agroecological transition in France

“…We were strongly inspired by ES socio-cultural assessment methods (Oteros-Rozas et al 2014;Rodríguez-Ortega et al 2014). We chose to use a qualitative survey approach with semi-structured interviews, which permits interviews to be organized around the topics studied without restricting the contents of survey responses (Miles and Huberman 1984).…”

“…Following previous strategies implemented in other contexts (Lamarque et al 2011;Oteros-Rozas et al 2014;Rodríguez-Ortega et al 2014) and based on our expertise and suggestions by the first interviewees, we interviewed actors concerned with the cultural and vitality (dis)services provided by livestock farming. The actors interviewed (Table 1) are belonging to the following categories for the livestock sector:…”

“…Still, the agroecological transition is mainly seen as a way to limit the negative impacts of farming on the environment without compromising farm economics (Duru et al 2015;Guillou et al 2013;MAAF 2012). Despite some recent changes in the concept of agroecology territories (Wezel et al 2016), research orientations tend to neglect the social dimension of agroecology that is particularly important for European livestock (Oteros-Rozas et al 2014;Rodríguez-Ortega et al 2014). The increasing use of the ecosystem service (ES) concept applied to agroecosystems (Barnaud and Antona 2014;Huang et al 2015) strengthens this tendency to overlook social aspects.…”

Towards an agroecological assessment of dairy systems: proposal for a set of criteria suited to mountain farming

“…Here, we place our specific contribution at the interface between production level and environmental footprint of animal production systems, which includes the different non-provisioning ecosystem services (i.e. regulating, supporting and cultural) sensu Díaz et al (2005) and Rodríguez-Ortega et al (2014). Dumont et al (2013) have proposed five principles to adapt the agroecological concept to animal production systems, thus illustrating its multidimensionality: (i) adopting management practices aiming to improve animal health, (ii) decreasing the inputs needed for production, (iii) decreasing pollution by optimizing the metabolic functioning of farming systems, (iv) enhancing diversity within animal production systems to strengthen their resilience and (v) preserving biological diversity in agroecosystems by adapting management practices.…”

Editorial: Agroecology for producing goods and services in sustainable animal farming systems

“…Rodríguez-Ortega et al, (2014) review the Ecosystem Service framework for integrating market and non-market functions, which allows the multiple trade-offs and synergies that can exist to be considered. They point at the multidimensionality of livestock production and present different methodologies to value ecosystem services from the biophysical, socio-cultural and economic perspectives.…”