Ecosystem Services in Land-Use Planning: An Application for Assessing Transformation Scenarios at the Local Scale
In the last twenty years, the debate over ecosystem services (ES) has intensively increased thanks to the growing awareness of the relevance of ecological and environmental problems. Initiatives like the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment or The Economics of
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, Elisa Zanetta,
Politecnico di Torino, Interuniversity Department of Regional and Urban Studies and Planning (DIST), Castello del Valentino: Viale Pier Andrea Mattioli, 39, 10125 Turin, Italy {caterina.caprioli,marta.bottero, giulio.mondini}@polito.it, [email protected]
Abstract. In the last twenty years, the debate over ecosystem services (ES) has intensively increased thanks to the growing awareness of the relevance of ecological and environmental problems. Initiatives like the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment or The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity have brought the ES concept into the international policy agenda, in turn stimulating the research. As a result, many applications have led to a very strong advance in the ecological and biophysical analysis of ES. However, in the context of landuse changes and transformation planning, the implications of ES have been only partially explored. Starting from a real case study, the present paper shows a tentative to bridge the gap between ES evaluation and transformation planning. The free software called Simulsoil is considered in the study to quantify, at the same time, biophysical and economic values of eight ES. Apart from the specific results of the simulation, the application shows the role of these analyses to support the decision-making process and the definition of alternative scenarios. In particular, the results can support the concertation between public administrations and developers in the definition of shared actions or, eventually, the identification of compensation measures. Keywords: Ecosystem services Land-use planning Evaluation approach Scenario-planning
Decision-making
1 Introduction: Ecosystem Services and Planning According to the most relevant definitions of Ecosystem Services (ES), there is a relevant degree of interdependence between humans and the rest of nature [1]. In this sense, De Groot et al. [2] and the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA) [3] define ES as benefits that humans obtain from ecosystem functions, whereas Costanza [4] and The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) [5] as direct and indirect contributions from ecosystems to human well-being. In addition to an “anthropocentric” view of the ES concept, those definitions underline how the whole system matters, both to humans and to the other species living on the Earth [1]. However, in this whole © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 C. Bevilacqua et al. (Eds.): NMP 2020, SIST 178, pp. 1332–1341, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-48279-4_124
Ecosystem Services in Land-Use Planning
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system, humans have the fundamental role and responsibility to protect and maintain this ecosystem and related services. To support this vision, in 2011, the EU adopted an ambitious strategy, setting out 6 targets and 20 actions to halt the loss of biodiversity and ecosystem services in the EU by 2020 [6], including increasing knowledge of ecosystems, promoting the development of green infrastructure and reducing biodiversity loss and services. For achieving th
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