What are Ecosystem Services? - Earth Economics

What are Ecosystem Services
Ecosystem services are benefits that people receive from natural systems.
Four categories of ecosystem services:
Provisioning services produce food, water, oxygen, buildings,
fuel, clothing, medicine, etc. Everything in our economy is
made from natural capital such as minerals, liquids, gases and
living things.
Regula0ng services create and maintain healthy
environmental condions. Examples are gas, and climate
stability, flood and storm protecon, water quality, soil
erosion control, and disease and pest control. These
contribute to ecosystem funcons and economic resilience.
Suppor0ng services maintain condions for life including
habitat, nutrient cycling, soil formaon, and pollinaon.
These natural processes are vital. Provided to us free of
charge, they are oCen leC out of economic analysis.
Cultural services provide meaningful human interacons
with ecosystems. Cultural services include spiritual,
recreaonal, scienfic, aesthec and educaonal value.
Portions of this project were produced with support from the Washington Department of Ecology grant #G0800012 -
Nisqually River Council Watershed Initiative Program.
Portions of this project were produced with support from the Puget Sound Partnership.
©2011 by Earth Economics

Resiliency is the ability of a system to withstand and recover
from disturbances such as polluon or natural disasters.
Ecosystems (forests or wetlands) are self‐maintaining and
remarkably resilient compared with built capital (car or levee).
Regulang services, such as water quality and climate
regulaon, create ecosystem resiliency by allowing it to connue
in a sustainable manner.
Goods and Services
Goods are things “you can drop on your toe.” Goods can be measured by quanty, such as
pounds of fish or gallons of water. Services are benefits you cannot “drop on your toe.” Such as
flood protecon or water quality. Goods can be valued with a price/quanty.
Services require different measures other than physical quanty produced. For example, labor,
water quality, or recreaon.
Ecosystem services
Ecosystem services require “natural capital”, such as a forest or marine ecosystem, with
physical and/or nonphysical processes to support human acvies and sustain life. For
example, forest and soils are natural capital assets that provide the ecosystem service of
filtering water without need of a costly filtraon plant.
A threshold is a point at which a system may
experience a dramac change or collapse. Thresholds
may include heavy rainfall triggering landslides and
floods, loss of habitat causing species exncon or
dramac climate change.
©2011 by Earth Economics