An Ecosystem Services Inventory: Lessons From the Northern Negev Long-Term Social Ecological Research (LTSER) Platform (original) (raw)

Despite the burgeoning popularity of the term ‘ecosystem services’, relatively little work has yet been done to identify, characterize and quantify ecosystem services and their spatial distribution across the landscape. In this study, we test a methodology for taking inventory of ecosystem services in Israel’s semi-arid Northern Negev region. We survey site managers of five long-term ecological research (LTER) sites regarding the presence/absence of 86 ecosystem services, and their level of confidence regarding their answers. There was a high percentage of services in three categories (provisioning, regulating and cultural) across all sites, and no significant differences based on environmental factors between sites. The only factor that correlated with differences in the package of services offered at each site was management agency (Ministry of Agriculture or Jewish National Fund-Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael). Through principle component analysis, we find that management agencies, thro...

Sign up for access to the world's latest research.

checkGet notified about relevant papers

checkSave papers to use in your research

checkJoin the discussion with peers

checkTrack your impact