Review The Contention That The Science Of Ecosystem Services Has Transformed The Way We Value Nature

Throughout the history of humanity, people have relied on the myriad services that ecosystems provide to survive and improve their quality of living. However in the last century the increasing use and often overexploitation of such services has led to a considerable and predominantly negative impact on ecosystems (Balmford and Bond, 2005). Consequently the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA) was set up to analyse ecosystems globally, and provide a novel framework for making decisions based on both conservation and development needs. The report popularised the science of ecosystem services (SES) and brought it into the forefront of economic and ecological research (Brauman et al., 2007). Ecosystem services (ES) can be defined as a trans-disciplinary science which attempts to quantify the outputs of ecosystems that contribute to the wellbeing of people (Haines-Young and Potschin, 2009), as well as the potential impact ecosystem change will have on such outputs (MA, 2005). Since its emergence ES has been identified as an influential and pragmatic tool for mapping and quantifying services. To what extent the SES has brought the conservation debate forward is controversial. However as governing bodies and organisations across the globe are increasingly adopting the ES framework as a method for making ecological decisions, it is important to question its usefulness and its impact on conservation (Simpson, 2011). Arguably one of the biggest transformations to the way nature is valued, that can be attributed to the SES, is the newly acknowledged `natural capital` of ecosystems. In the past ecosystems were not quantified in the same manner as economic services and manufactured capital. Consequently they were often neglected in policy decisions (Costanza et al., 1997). Instead arguments in favour of conservation regularly focussed on the moral obligation of society to preserve ecosystems as opposed to the huge value which they contribute to human wellbeing (Turner and Daily, 2008). The SES however brought a paradigm shift in the way in which ecosystems were viewed, based on the concept that people will not protect what they do not value. Therefore it is necessary to put an economic value on nature to encourage greater efforts to conserve natural resources (Reichert, 1997). Subsequently it is now much more commonplace to assess the monetary value of different ES this is reflected in the work done by The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB). A TEEB project in Switzerland investigated the economic value of the pollinating service delivered by bees. Bee populations are essential for the pollination of cultivated and wild plants, and are therefore indispensable in ensuring the maintenance of plant biodiversity and agricultural production (Kreman et al, 2002). Beekeeping within Switzerland is currently on a downward trend which could bring both economic and ecological damage, as it is a crucial tool for maintaining bee populations (BLW, 2008). The mass mortalities of bees in Switzerland led Fluri and Fricke (2005) to calculate the economic value of the pollinating service of bees within agricultural production. This was estimated at about 213 million US$. This valuation highlighted the importance of bees for the economy and caught the attention of governmental bodies, and as a result led to several conservation orientated policies being introduced to increase bee numbers. In addition economic valuation can provide a method for decision makers to assess trade-offs among alternative scenarios of resource delegation and determine the best land use solution. The ES framework has been instrumental in highlighting the often neglected benefit of conserving or restoring an ecosystem to its natural state, as frequently the inherent value of an ecosystem is not recognised until its removal (Daily, 1997). In a study by Boerema et al. (2014) of the Nete catchment in Belgium, extensive land use changes in the area have put extra pressure on the low land rivers to drain greater amounts of water than in previous years. This problem was exacerbated by water flow being hindered by natural aquatic vegetation. Without using an ES framework river managers decided that the removal of vegetation was a clear solution to alleviate the risk of flooding. However when a complete assessment was undertaken, examining all ecosystem services not just flooding, it was established that the costs of vegetation removal far exceeded the benefits. Thus the ES framework provided utilitarian evidence that the conservation of the natural state of the ecosystem was economically favourable and preferable to its alteration. It has also been identified that in addition to calculating the economic value of ecosystems, it is imperative to determine how they affect different stakeholders within society and what this means for issues such as poverty and justice (Vira et al., 2010). Traditionally the issues of poverty reduction and conservation were seen as separate policy sectors. However with the rise of ecosystem services, it was recognised that one of the major factors leading to environmental degradation was poverty (CBD, 2010). Therefore if the conservation of biodiversity is to be truly sustainable it is necessary to address the poverty agenda (Adams et al., 2004). Due to the trans-disciplinary nature of the ES framework it offers the potential for developing integrated approaches that quantify both the biophysical and social context, using knowledge from across ecology and the social sciences (Haines-Young and Potschin, 2009). For example the holistic approach of ES gives the potential for the implementation of the relatively recent concept of `multiple wins`, whereby a project meets both biodiversity goals and poverty alleviation goals. Tallis et al. (2008) concluded that by using the framework of ES it could be possible to identify and use indicators that could increase the chance of multiple win outcomes. One such example is the introduction of fish spillover mechanisms in over a hundred marine areas in Fiji that were suffering from the impacts of overfishing (WRI, 2005). In this strategy areas of marine habitat were protected from fishing, allowing fish populations to recover and spill over into adjacent unprotected areas. This approach proved effective by providing several benefits not only to the environment by improving marine biodiversity but also to the local community in the region. For instance after five years of the policy being established the income of local villages roughly doubled in two of these protected areas, thus reducing poverty in the region (Leisher et al., 2007). This study highlights that for a conservation policy to be truly successful it needs to provide long term benefits to the local communities or it will not be socially sustainable. Another component that was key to the success of the project was the involvement of the local community in organising and managing the marine zones. In the past conservation programs were often installed without community participation, which frequently gave rise to adverse results, for example the displacement of people in the creation of national parks often resulted in these areas being raided for resources (Cernea and Schmidt-Soltau, 2006). The SES however recognised communities as important stakeholders (Danielsen et al., 2010) and the value of empowering local people to take the lead in the management of their environment. For example a payment for ecosystem services scheme by Rawlins and Westby (2013) in the Caura Valley in Trinidad, ensured that it was local communities that designed and implemented the project. Using local knowledge, fire was identified as the major threat to the ecosystems, and fire trails could be developed for not only forest protection but also ecotourism, as they can be used as hiking trails. Importantly this method brought locals back in touch with their surroundings and gave them a reason to conserve their locality themselves, as successful implementation would provide guiding services to hikers, which could deliver long term job creation within the tourism sector. Lastly SES has contributed to the development of mapping and modelling methods that are able to integrate socio-ecological factors into a single system. Several studies have shown that Bayesian belief networks (BBNs) can be employed to display and integrate available expert knowledge with empirical data, in order to reinforce conservation decisions when large amounts of empirical data is unavailable (Smith et al., 2007). Laws et al. (2012) used a BBN as a scenario-building tool for the selection of translocation sites for numerous endangered island birds. Although not one hundred percent accurate it was acknowledged that the model was very valuable in narrowing candidates for release, without involving the time consuming task of physically assessing all the islands. This enables strategies to be implemented within a much quicker time scale, which is a crucial to combating the rapid global biodiversity loss. However, it has been argued that the SES is just a new name for an existing idea, and it has not significantly changed people`s perceptions of nature or influenced conservation policy. The problem of humans degrading their environment is an age old problem that has occurred throughout history. Plato for example understood that the activities of humans could lead to undesirable impacts on the environment (Mooney, 1997). As the conservation agenda has evolved, it has taken several forms in providing evidence for the preservation of the environment. For instance the science of sustainable development was highly popular in the 1970-80s until it began to lose momentum in the 1990s. It could be claimed that the SES is just a reinvention of sustainable development and has very similar goals and objectives. Consequently the fact that the SES had to be created to regain interest in the field, emphasises its ineffectiveness in significantly transforming people`s perception of nature and the extent to which it needs to be conserved. In addition, the utilitarian approach of assigning economic values to ES has been found to be problematic and imprecise. The anthropocentric nature of assigning instrumental values means that there will be occasions when the human valuation of ES may differ markedly from the value ecosystem functions provide to other species or to the wellbeing of the ecosystem itself (Farber et al., 2002). For example using spatial mapping Chan et al. (2006) established that within the Central Coast ecoregion of California the top biodiversity hotspots were not always in areas with the greatest flow of ecosystem services. This draws attention to the potential problem that the reasons underlying ecosystem services are not always the same as those that maximise biodiversity (Balvanera, et al., 2001). This is particularly relevant in environments that are either so remote that they cannot contribute to human economic activity or are deemed economically irrelevant. The dismissal of such ecosystems could have serious implications on biodiversity, as these areas could be important for conservation and are at risk of being ignored using the ES framework. Therefore it is important to consider the intrinsic value of an ecosystem service in addition to its instrumental value when using the ES framework. Furthermore although the economic valuation of ES has a big presence in the biodiversity literature, there are relatively few cases in which it has been demonstrated to be a major factor in changing policy in favour of conservation. This discrepancy highlights a fundamental weakness in the framework as it is just a tool and is useless without implementation. Consequently this questions the relevance of ES valuation, if studies do not explicitly state how they will be used to influence decision-making. Laurans and Mermet (2014) propose that this is due to an unsatisfactory fit of the ES valuations into the governmental aspect of decision making, and suggest that the utilisation of both rationalisation based and process based methods is necessary. Furthermore it has also been observed that within the SES there appears to be a bias in publications towards optimistic findings in terms of environmental conservation, with very few unsuccessful examples (Pearce, 2007). This suggests that papers which demonstrate economic valuation in a positive light have a greater chance of being published, however this is an example of poor scientific practice as it is often the case that unsuccessful strategies provide essential and useful information. Furthermore, it is currently only the minority of studies which have managed to achieve win-win outcomes for both biodiversity and poverty alleviation (Tallis et al. 2008). Consequently much more research needs to be done into understanding why in some cases improvements to ES such as soil stability and flood control benefit poorer communities, but in other cases it appears only to make a limited difference. The Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation (ESPA) (2011) argue that for conservation and poverty alleviation policies to work in harmony the concept of environmental justice needs to be incorporated into the ES framework. This is to ensure that ecosystem management decisions yields dividends to those within society who need it most, as it is only through equal distribution of services across the globe that a sustainable future will be possible. To conclude, even though there are many areas where the SES needs to be developed and refined, it is still in its relative infancy and improvements are continually being applied. The huge volume of literature that has been published on the subject on both scientific and non-scientific platforms, highlights the interest and passion it has inspired in people. It delivers a fresh perspective on how to conserve the planet, using pragmatic positive methods to recover biodiversity instead of merely making demoralising projections into the future. Importantly through the incorporation of people into the ecosystem framework itself, a direct link with nature has been established which with the rise of modern society, was progressively being lost. It offers several tools that can be used to aid conservation decisions by providing quantified evidence such as in the form of BBNs. Additionally the trans-disciplinary nature of the SES gives it a crucial role in enabling different fields to communicate with each other and find solutions together. If people are going to combat the numerous threats to biodiversity, it will only be through combined knowledge in the form of an integrated framework.