Ecosystem Services and Natural Resource Management Practice Change

Product Information

On the 12 March 2009 a roundtable allowed Roel Plant and Simone Maynard to share the results of their research and experience. The meeting was hosted and funded by Land & Water Australia.

Roel’s project was funded by the Social and Institutional Research Program and Simone’s travel to the US had been made possible through Social and Institutional Research funding.

What is Ecosystem Services?

Ecosystem Services are the goods and services provided by natural (and semi-natural) ecosystems that benefit, sustain and support the well-being of people. They include the production of food and medicines, the regulation of climate and disease, provision of productive soils and clean water, and landscape opportunities for recreation and spiritual benefits.

Since the Ecosystem Services (ES) concept emerged about 15 years ago and the number of academic papers on Australian ES has increased sharply. Evidence of application in Australian Natural Resource Management practice has been slower to emerge, in contrast to the growing momentum of ES in the US and Europe.

The Caring for Our Country (CfoC) goal is a rich embodiment of the ES concept and so there is an ongoing interest in developing skills, knowledge and understanding of the associated operational issues and how these play out at regional scales.

Researchers

Roel Plant
University of Technology, Sydney,
Roel has just finished a stock-take of Australian experiences based on a grey literature review and interviews with Catchment Management Authority staff. Results shared in the meeting showed that thinking about natural resources as providing economic value has broadly found its way into Natural Resource Management practice. However some Catchment Management Authorities regard the ES concept to be a buzzword from the past, while others would like to engage more with ES thinking but lack the incentives and tools to do so.

Download» Roel Plant’s presentation

Simone Maynard
South East Queensland Catchments (SEQ)
Simone recently travelled to Spain and the US to share her experience on developing a framework for ecosystem services in South East Queensland and reported to participants on the South East Queensland Catchments approach and the leading edges of ES from around the world. An exciting aspect is how SEQ is currently relating the UN Millennium Ecosystem Assessment ideas on how ecosystem services affect human well-being This was a refreshing line-of-sight application of ES.

Download» Simone Mynard’s presentation

More information and presentations