Skip to main content

Lund University Publications

LUND UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

Valuing and mapping cork and carbon across land use scenarios in a Portuguese montado landscape

von Essen, Marius ; do Rosário, Inês T. ; Santos-Reis, Margarida and Nicholas, Kimberly A. LU orcid (2019) In PLoS ONE 14(3).
Abstract

The ecosystem services approach can inform decision-making by accounting for both short- and long-term benefits from different land use options. Here we used the InVEST toolkit to quantify and map key ecosystem services at the largest publicly-owned agro-silvo-pastoral farmstead in Portugal–a site representative for the montado landscape. We analyzed how Provisioning (cork production) and Regulating & Maintenance (carbon storage and sequestration) services would be affected under three land use change scenarios, which were developed in collaboration with the forest manager of the study area: Cattle Intensification, Forest Improvement, and Residential Development. Results show that increasing cattle or residential development would... (More)

The ecosystem services approach can inform decision-making by accounting for both short- and long-term benefits from different land use options. Here we used the InVEST toolkit to quantify and map key ecosystem services at the largest publicly-owned agro-silvo-pastoral farmstead in Portugal–a site representative for the montado landscape. We analyzed how Provisioning (cork production) and Regulating & Maintenance (carbon storage and sequestration) services would be affected under three land use change scenarios, which were developed in collaboration with the forest manager of the study area: Cattle Intensification, Forest Improvement, and Residential Development. Results show that increasing cattle or residential development would deliver substantially lower levels of services. We find that extensive management, improvements to forest quality, and promotion of traditional livestock grazing would provide the highest levels of assessed ecosystem services, resulting in 13.5% more carbon storage (worth between $0.34-$7.79 million USD depending on carbon price) and 62.7% more cork production (total value of USD $3.5 million) than the current land use. However, a shift in economic incentives to make sustainable cork harvesting and traditional low-density grazing of smaller ruminants like sheep and goats profitable are likely needed to reward traditional land stewardship and help support this iconic Mediterranean landscape in the future.

(Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
; ; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
PLoS ONE
volume
14
issue
3
article number
e0212174
publisher
Public Library of Science (PLoS)
external identifiers
  • scopus:85062638377
  • pmid:30845222
ISSN
1932-6203
DOI
10.1371/journal.pone.0212174
project
Sustainable Land and Food Systems
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
881e5fb0-989b-4d9e-bbed-61c9dcc8675a
date added to LUP
2019-03-20 09:32:06
date last changed
2024-04-30 03:01:01
@article{881e5fb0-989b-4d9e-bbed-61c9dcc8675a,
  abstract     = {{<p>The ecosystem services approach can inform decision-making by accounting for both short- and long-term benefits from different land use options. Here we used the InVEST toolkit to quantify and map key ecosystem services at the largest publicly-owned agro-silvo-pastoral farmstead in Portugal–a site representative for the montado landscape. We analyzed how Provisioning (cork production) and Regulating &amp; Maintenance (carbon storage and sequestration) services would be affected under three land use change scenarios, which were developed in collaboration with the forest manager of the study area: Cattle Intensification, Forest Improvement, and Residential Development. Results show that increasing cattle or residential development would deliver substantially lower levels of services. We find that extensive management, improvements to forest quality, and promotion of traditional livestock grazing would provide the highest levels of assessed ecosystem services, resulting in 13.5% more carbon storage (worth between $0.34-$7.79 million USD depending on carbon price) and 62.7% more cork production (total value of USD $3.5 million) than the current land use. However, a shift in economic incentives to make sustainable cork harvesting and traditional low-density grazing of smaller ruminants like sheep and goats profitable are likely needed to reward traditional land stewardship and help support this iconic Mediterranean landscape in the future.</p>}},
  author       = {{von Essen, Marius and do Rosário, Inês T. and Santos-Reis, Margarida and Nicholas, Kimberly A.}},
  issn         = {{1932-6203}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{03}},
  number       = {{3}},
  publisher    = {{Public Library of Science (PLoS)}},
  series       = {{PLoS ONE}},
  title        = {{Valuing and mapping cork and carbon across land use scenarios in a Portuguese montado landscape}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0212174}},
  doi          = {{10.1371/journal.pone.0212174}},
  volume       = {{14}},
  year         = {{2019}},
}