Alteration of freshwater ecosystem services under global change – A review focusing on the Po River basin (Italy) and the Red River basin (Vietnam)

Abstract

Freshwater ecosystem services are negatively affected by factors such as climate change (e.g. changes in temperature, precipitation, and sea level rise) and human interventions (e.g. agriculture practices, impoundment of dams, and land use/land cover change). Moreover, the potential synergic impacts of these factors on ecosystems are unevenly distributed, depending on geographical, climatic and socio-economic conditions. The paper aims to review the complex effects of climatic and non-climatic drivers on the supply and demand of freshwater ecosystem services. Based on the literature, we proposed a conceptual framework and a set of indicators for assessing the above-mentioned impacts due to global change, i.e. climate change and human activities. Then, we checked their applicability to the provisioning services of two well-known case studies, namely the Po River basin (Italy) and the Red River basin (Vietnam).To define the framework and the indicators, we selected the most relevant papers and reports; identified the major drivers and the most relevant services; and finally summarized the fundamental effects of these drivers on those services. We concluded that the proposed framework was applicable to the analyzed case studies, but it was not straightforward to consider all the indicators since ecosystem services were not explicitly considered as key assessment endpoints in these areas. Additionally, the supply of ecosystem services was found to draw much more attention than their demand. Finally, we highlighted the importance of defining a common and consistent terminology and classification of drivers, services, and effects to reduce mismatches among ecosystem services when conducting a risk assessment.