Abstract
Changes in land use and land cover (LULC) are the leading contributors to the decline and loss of ecosystem services in the world. The present study covered the Central Rift Valley lakes basin in Ethiopia, focusing on the valley floor and the East and West escarpments, to analyze changes in LULC and to estimate associated losses in ecosystem service values (ESVs). Covering both upstream and downstream areas in the basin, the study addressed major gaps in existing studies by connecting the sources and sinks of material (e.g., sediment and water) in source-to-lake systems. Additionally, the study facilitated the identification of critical areas for conserving natural resources and reversing the decline of associated ESVs in the Central Rift Valley. A post-classification comparison approach was used to detect LULC changes between 1973 and 2020 using four Landsat images from 1973, 1990, 2005 and 2020. The value transfer valuation method was used to estimate the changes in ESVs due to LULC changes. Among the seven major identified LULC classes, farmlands, settlements, and bare lands showed positive changes, while forestlands, grasslands, shrublands and waterbodies showed negative changes over the last 47 years. The expansion of farmlands, for example, has occurred at the expense of grasslands, forestlands and shrublands. The changes in LULC over a period of 47 years resulted in a total loss of US $62,110.4 × 106 in ESVs. The contributors to the overall loss of ESVs in decreasing order are provisioning services (US $33,795.1 × 106), cultural services (US $28,981.5 × 106) and regulating services (US $652.9 × 106). The results imply that addressing the degradation of land and water resources is crucial to reversing the loss of ecosystem services and achieving the national Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) related to food and water security (SDGs 2 and 6) and life on land (SDG 15).
Highlights
The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment [1] defined Ecosystem Services as “the benefits people derive from ecosystems”
The objective of the present study was to analyze the land use and land cover (LULC) dynamics in both upstream, and downstream areas in the Central Rift Valley (CRV), to enhance understanding of how LULC changes drive the loss of different types of ecosystem services, including provisioning, regulating, supporting, and cultural, and to facilitate the identification of critical areas for conserving natural resources and reversing the decline of associated ecosystem service values (ESVs) in the CRV
The results of the present study indicate that the impacts of LULC changes in the basin on ecosystem services are considerable
Summary
The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment [1] defined Ecosystem Services as “the benefits people derive from ecosystems”. The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) and the Dasgupta review defined ecosystem services as the direct and indirect contributions of ecosystems to human well-being [2,3]. The services and functions obtained from natural ecosystems have diverse ecological, cultural, and economic importance [4]. The major ecosystems and biodiversity that underpin them are still being degraded and lost at an unprecedented scale [5]. The review by Davidson [6] reported that the long-term loss of global natural wetlands averages between 54–57% but losses since 1700 AD may have been as high as 87%. More recently Arora [7] suggested that around 60% of global ecosystem services have been degraded in just 50 years. Since 1990, it is estimated that 420 million hectares of forest have been lost through conversion to other land uses, with the rate of deforestation between 2015 and 2020 estimated at 10 million hectares per year [8]
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