APES Notes 2.2 - Ecosystem Services

Summary

In this video, Mr. Smeeds explains the concept of ecosystem services, which are goods and services provided by natural ecosystems that have measurable economic value. The video covers the four types of ecosystem services: provisioning (goods like food and wood), regulating (climate and air quality control), supporting (services like pollination), and cultural (recreation and scientific knowledge). It also discusses how human activities such as deforestation and overfishing can degrade these services, leading to both ecological and economic consequences. Viewers are encouraged to think critically about the impacts of these disruptions.

Takeaways

• 🌳 Ecosystem services are goods or services provided by ecosystems that have economic value to humans and can be quantified in monetary terms.
• 🍎 Provisioning services include goods directly taken from ecosystems, like food (apples, fish), wood, paper, and products made from natural resources.
• 🌦️ Regulating services involve benefits such as climate regulation (trees absorbing CO2) and reducing health care costs by filtering pollutants, leading to economic savings.
• 🐝 Supporting services help humans perform processes more efficiently, such as pollinators supporting agriculture and wetlands filtering water, reducing the need for water treatment.
• 🏞️ Cultural services are tied to recreation and tourism, generating income through park fees and tourism spending, and contributing to scientific discoveries that have economic benefits.
• 🚫 Human activities like deforestation and overfishing disrupt ecosystem services, leading to both ecological and economic consequences, such as climate change and loss of jobs.
• 🔥 Overfishing may boost short-term profits but leads to long-term declines in fish populations, impacting jobs and revenue from fishing industries.
• 🌱 Deforestation increases CO2 levels, intensifying climate change and resulting in more storm damage and crop failures, which have significant economic consequences.
• 🐟 Degraded ecosystems from pollution and habitat destruction reduce the effectiveness of ecosystem services like water filtration and food production, leading to higher costs.
• 🏕️ Disruptions to cultural services, such as deforestation and urbanization, reduce tourism and scientific discoveries, which in turn negatively affect local economies and research advancements.

Q & A

What are ecosystem services?

Ecosystem services are goods or functions provided by ecosystems that have measurable economic or financial value to humans. These can be goods like wood or fish, or services such as climate regulation.

What are the four categories of ecosystem services?

The four categories of ecosystem services are provisioning services, regulating services, supporting services, and cultural services.

Can you provide an example of provisioning ecosystem services?

Provisioning services include goods taken directly from ecosystems, like apples, fish, wood, and paper. These are resources humans use or sell.

What is an example of regulating ecosystem services?

Regulating services include benefits like trees reducing carbon dioxide levels, helping mitigate climate change and reducing storm damage and health care costs.

How do supporting ecosystem services help human activities?

Supporting services are processes done by ecosystems that help human activities, such as pollinators aiding agriculture by improving crop yields, which increases profits and reduces food prices.

What are cultural ecosystem services?

Cultural services include economic benefits from recreational activities, such as tourism and park fees, and profits from scientific research based on ecosystems.

How can human activities disrupt ecosystem services?

Human activities like logging, deforestation, and overfishing can degrade ecosystem services, leading to ecological damage and economic losses, such as reduced fish populations or lost tourism revenue.

How does deforestation affect regulating ecosystem services?

Deforestation reduces the ability of trees to store carbon dioxide, increasing the amount in the atmosphere, accelerating climate change, and leading to more intense storms and crop failures.

How does overfishing disrupt provisioning services?

Overfishing depletes fish populations faster than they can replenish, leading to the collapse of fisheries, which results in lost jobs, reduced future revenue, and ecological damage.

Why is protecting pollinator habitats important for supporting ecosystem services?

Pollinators, such as bees, increase crop productivity and support agriculture. Destroying their habitats, like prairies or wetlands, can reduce crop yields and increase costs for farmers.