Bringing Ecosystem Services into Decision-Making—2nd Edition

Dear Colleagues,

In complex socio-ecological systems, human well-being and the sustainable development of society ultimately depend on the ecosystem services provided by nature. The spatial mismatch characteristics of the supply, flow, and demand of ecosystem services such as food supply, flood regulation, and carbon sequestration can have a non-negligible impact on the sustainable development of human society. At the same time, there are large differences between different regional and spatial scales in decision-making strategies for natural capital management, conservation, and planning. For example, the strategic objectives of food supply chains are significantly different at the national and regional scales, and, therefore, there is an urgent need to address the challenges of disconnected policies at multiple scales from different perspectives to strategic objectives. By analogy, decision-making sectors with a long tradition of natural resource management, such as tourism, water, and forestry, most often deal with decision-making related to the management, conservation, and spatial planning of ecosystem services such as landscape recreation, flood regulation, and carbon sequestration as a means of achieving synergies among multiple ecosystem services to sustain human benefits and social sustainability. Therefore, it is essential to integrate ecosystem services into decision-making. Recent ecosystem-services-related research aims to inform multiple policy sectors, but only a very small number of studies clearly address a particular policy. To bridge the science–policy gap at this level, assessments of the effects of these policies from the perspective of human well-being and social sustainability is needed to better meet the requirements of decision-makers.

Dr. Zhe Feng
Prof. Dr. Huafu Zhao
Guest Editors

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