Ecosystem Services
What are ecosystem services?
Everyone in the world depends on the Earth’s ecosystems and the services they provide, such as food, water, disease management, climate regulation, spiritual fulfillment and aesthetic enjoyment. These concepts are ecosystem services.
Ecosystem services are generally divided into a few categories, based on how people live with them:
- Provisioning services: Products that come from ecosystems, such as food, fresh water, fuel and pharmaceuticals.
- Regulating services: Benefits that come from regulating ecosystem processes, such as climate regulation, water purification and flood control.
- Cultural services: Nonmaterial benefits people get from ecosystems, such as recreation, spiritual and aesthetic values, and inspiration
- Supporting services: Services that are needed for all other ecosystem services, such as nutrient cycling, soil formation, and plants capturing sunlight for growth.
More information about these categories can be found in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment.
Why are ecosystem services a hot topic?
Land management and conservation continue to evolve as we learn more about the dynamic landscapes and resources that we care for.
In recent years, attention has shifted toward ensuring the sustainability of natural systems, within the context of human activities. People and lawmakers are beginning to see that the costs associated with the depletion of natural systems have long term consequences. Valuing the ecosystem services provided by healthy natural systems is one way to ensure that they will be managed sustainably.
AFF's work is about highlighting the benefits provided to people by healthy ecological systems. The hope is that people will continue to see the values provided to them by nature, so they will in turn take action to sustainably manage natural resources in ways that the many ecological services they provide will continue to be available
How do ecosystem markets work?
Just like any other marketplace, ecosystem markets work based on supply and demand. Working with a variety of partners to create the demand for a paid supply of these services. The services—clean water, wildlife protection, even carbon storage—have been provided for free. AFF's work is to generate income for forest owners for these services, so they can continue to offer them through healthy and productive forests.
What does that have to do with me and my woods?
More than 10 million landowners own 264 million acres—or 35 percent—of forestland in the U.S. Privately owned woodlands provide many benefits for all Americans, in the form of clean water, wildlife habitat, and forest products.
Most forestland owners have expenses associated with the ownership and management of land, including property taxes. Many landowners are interested in opportunities available to generate income on their land in ways that mesh with overall ownership goals and objectives.
Some landowners harvest timber, others lease land for hunting, some host recreation sites and some offer protection for endangered species. It often takes a number of these income streams together to help offset land ownership costs. Payments for ecosystem services, such as carbon storage and water filtration, are one way to diversify income streams for forestland owners.
In any given year, landowners may receive some income from harvesting timber, some income from Farm Bill conservation programs, and some income from a hunting lease. A landowner may also receive income from selling carbon credits based on the amount of carbon held in trees on their property, or from water quality or habitat credits generated through land management practices designed to protect clean water and wildlife habitat.
What we hear all the time from woodland owners is that they would reinvest these income streams back into their property. If payment for ecosystem services were more widely available, more family forest owners would have the resources to put back into their forestland.
What is American Forest Foundation doing to support ecosystem services that help private landowners?
Well-managed private forestland is critical to protect the diversity of nature and maintain healthy and productive ecosystems across the country. Right now, owners of working forestland are looking for ways to continue their sound stewardship and gain access to the new market opportunities for ecosystem services that are emerging.
AFF co-sponsors the annual national Ecosystem Markets Conference, now in its 4th year. The conference convenes the world’s top thought leaders to not only discuss the state of ecosystem markets, but to tackle the tough issues facing these markets in order to determine how to drive them forward. Register today for the Ecosystem Markets Conference in Madison, Wisconsin, June 29-July 11, 2011.
AFF has also developed pilot projects to demonstrate different ways that landowners may receive payments for protecting water quality in the northeast, and for creating and maintaining gopher tortoise habitat in the Southeast.