Abstract
ContextRecent conceptual developments in ecosystem services research have revealed the need to elucidate the complex and unintended relationships between humans and the environment if we are to better understand and manage ecosystem services in practice.ObjectivesThis study aimed to develop a model that spatially represents a complex human–environment (H–E) system consisting of heterogeneous social–ecological components and feedback mechanisms at multiple scales, in order to assess multi-dimensional (spatial, temporal, and social) trade-offs in ecosystem services.MethodsWe constructed an agent-based model and empirically calibrated it for a semi-arid region in Northeast China, and examined ecosystem service trade-offs derived from the Sloping Land Conversion Program (SLCP), which is based on payment for ecosystem services. This paper describes our model, named Inner Mongolia Land Use Dynamic Simulator (IM-LUDAS), using the overview, design concepts, and details + decision (ODD + D) protocol and demonstrates the capabilities of IM-LUDAS through simulations.ResultsIM-LUDAS represented typical characteristics of complex H–E systems, such as secondary and cross-scale feedback loops, time lags, and threshold change, revealing the following results: tree plantations expanded by the SLCP facilitated vegetation and soil restoration and household change toward off-farm livelihoods, as expected by the government; conversely, the program caused further land degradation outside the implementation plots; moreover, the livelihood changes were not large enough to compensate for income deterioration by policy-induced reduction in cropland.ConclusionsIM-LUDAS proved itself to be an advanced empirical model that can recreate essential features of complex H–E systems and assess multi-dimensional trade-offs in ecosystem services.
Highlights
The concept of ecosystem services has drawn attention in the past two decades, since the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA) report in 2005, as a crucial bridge between human society and the environment
The effectiveness of vegetation and soil restoration in converted tree plantations was higher in Scenario 2 (S2) than in Scenario 1 (S1); for instance, the diversity of understory herbaceous plant species expressed by Shannon’s diversity index (H’) increased in S2, though it had decreased over time in S1 (Fig. 3)
There was a dramatic reduction in S2, which can be explained by the fact that the first round of the Sloping Land Conversion Program (SLCP) was implemented in both S2 and S1 in 2010, but in the subsequent years, the altered SLCP was implemented only in S2
Summary
The concept of ecosystem services has drawn attention in the past two decades, since the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA) report in 2005, as a crucial bridge between human society and the environment (de Groot et al 2010; Reynolds et al 2011; Wu 2013). The MA provided a conceptual framework for holistic approaches that integrate ecological, economic, and institutional perspectives, and aimed to answer policy-relevant questions on the sustainable use of natural resources (MA 2005). The concept of ecosystem services has become a guiding principle in resource management and relevant policies (Wu 2013), and more elaborate conceptual frameworks have been developed, such as Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) Conceptual Framework (Dıaz et al 2015). According to Bennett et al (2015), this gap is mainly due to two reasons: knowledge on ecosystem services is fragmented into many disciplinary studies and not well integrated; and most research on ecosystem services is conceptual or deals with only one aspect of the interaction between people and ecosystems.
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