Future Ecosystem Services in a Southern African River Basin: a Scenario Planning Approach to Uncertainty

Bohensky, Erin; Reyers, Belinda; Jaarsveld, A. S. van

doi:10.1111/j.1523-1739.2006.00475.x

Cited by 98 publications

(63 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…Regulating services underpin the sustained supply of other essential services and are critical to maintain resilience of production systems (7,20). Hence, this type of tradeoff implies a compromise between current and future needs (43). Environmental externalities that increase food supply at the expense of regulating services such as water purification may undermine the resilience of agricultural landscapes and the ecosystem services they provide.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spatial interactions among ecosystem services in an urbanizing agricultural watershed

Qiu

Turner

2013

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

381

244

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Understanding spatial distributions, synergies, and tradeoffs of multiple ecosystem services (benefits people derive from ecosystems) remains challenging. We analyzed the supply of 10 ecosystem services for 2006 across a large urbanizing agricultural watershed in the Upper Midwest of the United States, and asked the following: (i) Where are areas of high and low supply of individual ecosystem services, and are these areas spatially concordant across services? (ii) Where on the landscape are the strongest tradeoffs and synergies among ecosystem services located? (iii) For ecosystem service pairs that experience tradeoffs, what distinguishes locations that are "win-win" exceptions from other locations? Spatial patterns of high supply for multiple ecosystem services often were not coincident; locations where six or more services were produced at high levels (upper 20th percentile) occupied only 3.3% of the landscape. Most relationships among ecosystem services were synergies, but tradeoffs occurred between crop production and water quality. Ecosystem services related to water quality and quantity separated into three different groups, indicating that management to sustain freshwater services along with other ecosystem services will not be simple. Despite overall tradeoffs between crop production and water quality, some locations were positive for both, suggesting that tradeoffs are not inevitable everywhere and might be ameliorated in some locations. Overall, we found that different areas of the landscape supplied different suites of ecosystem services, and their lack of spatial concordance suggests the importance of managing over large areas to sustain multiple ecosystem services.hydrologic services | landscape heterogeneity | sustainability | Wisconsin | Yahara Watershed R esearch on ecosystem services-the benefits people obtain from nature-has grown rapidly (1-3), yet understanding of the interactions among multiple ecosystem services across heterogeneous landscapes remains limited (3-5). Ecosystem services may interact in complex ways (6, 7). Synergies arise when multiple services are enhanced simultaneously (4), and tradeoffs occur when the provision of one service is reduced as a consequence of increased use of another (7). Managing spatial relationships among diverse ecosystem services may help to strengthen landscape resilience, but interactions among services and their spatial patterns are not well understood (4). Ecosystem service supply has been mapped at various scales (8-12), and spatial concordance among services has been examined to identify "winwin" opportunities for ecosystem service conservation (13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19). However, few studies have dealt simultaneously with tradeoffs and synergies among a suite of ecosystem services (20)(21)(22), and none have done so using spatially explicit analyses. Thus, little is known about where tradeoffs and synergies among ecosystem services are most pronounced. Such information could identify areas of disproportionate importance in a landscape, such as...

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spatial interactions among ecosystem services in an urbanizing agricultural watershed

Qiu

Turner

2013

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

381

244

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“…Little evidence and quantitative analysis on the interactions and linkages among ecosystem services bundles had been recognized as a major research gap regarding ecosystem services (Carpenter et al, 2009) and resulted in mixed conclusions (Bohensky et al, 2006). Recently, in order to provide implications for sustainable land-use management, researches on the types of interactions and the corresponding feedbacks among different ecosystem services are stimulated.…”

Section: Trade-offs In Ecosystemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A review on trade-off analysis of ecosystem services for sustainable land-use management

2016

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Ecosystem services are substantial elements for human society. The central challenge to meet the human needs from ecosystems while sustain the Earth's life support systems makes it urgent to enhance efficient natural resource management for sustainable ecological and socioeconomic development. Trade-off analysis of ecosystem services can help to identify optimal decision points to balance the costs and benefits of the diverse human uses of ecosystems. In this sense, the aim of this paper is to provide key insights into ecosystem services trade-off analysis at different scales from a land use perspective, by comprehensively reviewing the trade-offs analysis tools and approaches that addressed in ecology, economics and other fields. The review will significantly contribute to future research on trade-off analysis to avoid inferior management options and offer a win-win solution based on comprehensive and efficient planning for interacting multiple ecosystem services.

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“…They are alternative "possible views of the world" created to help improve understanding and decision-making (Ringland 2002, p. 3). Scenarios allow for expressions of ambiguity through "qualitative causal thinking" (van der Heijden 1996, p. 15) and thus have proven to be well-suited to tackling complex social-ecological problems that are fraught with uncertainty (e.g., Peterson et al 2003, Bohensky et al 2006, Carpenter et al 2005.…”

Section: Scenariosmentioning

confidence: 99%

Using Participatory Scenarios to Stimulate Social Learning for Collaborative Sustainable Development

Johnson¹,

Dana²,

Jordan³

et al. 2012

E&S

115

104

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ABSTRACT. Interdependent human and biophysical systems are highly complex and behave in unpredictable and uncontrollable ways. Social and ecological challenges that emerge from this complexity often defy straightforward solutions, and efforts to address these problems will require not only scientific and technological capabilities but also learning and adaptation.Scenarios are a useful tool for grappling with the uncertainty and complexity of social-ecological challenges because they enable participants to build adaptive capacity through the contemplation of multiple future possibilities. Furthermore, scenarios provide a platform for social learning, which is critical to acting in the face of uncertain, complex, and conflict-laden problems. We studied the Minnesota 2050 project, a collaborative project through which citizens collectively imagined future scenarios and contemplated the implications of these possibilities for the adaptability of their social and environmental communities.Survey and interview data indicate that these participatory scenario workshops built and strengthened relationships, enhanced participants' understanding of other perspectives, and triggered systemic thinking, all of which is relevant to collective efforts to respond to social-ecological challenges through sustainable development activities. Our analysis shows that participatory scenarios can stimulate social learning by enabling participants to engage and to discuss options for coping with uncertainty through collaborative actions. Such learning can be of value to participants and to the organizations and decisions in which they are engaged, and scenario processes can be effective tools for supporting collaborative sustainable development efforts.

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Future Ecosystem Services in a Southern African River Basin: a Scenario Planning Approach to Uncertainty

Cited by 98 publications

References 29 publications

Spatial interactions among ecosystem services in an urbanizing agricultural watershed

Spatial interactions among ecosystem services in an urbanizing agricultural watershed

A review on trade-off analysis of ecosystem services for sustainable land-use management

Using Participatory Scenarios to Stimulate Social Learning for Collaborative Sustainable Development

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