Abstract
Ecosystem services are provided to humanity by single key-species or functional groups. However, these species are always a part of a larger ecological network via direct and indirect interactions with other species. From research on ecological networks we know that disturbances, such as species extinctions, in one part of the network can have severe consequences for species in other parts of the network. Therefore, management of ecosystem services needs to take the whole network into account in order to secure a sustained provision of the services. The aim of this project is to combine research on ecological networks with research on ecosystem services. The project will answer the following questions: (i) Under what circumstances is network information critical for understanding the risk disturbances, such as species losses, pose for ecosystem service provisioning? (ii) Can trait-based groupings of species provide a cost-effective way to infer critical characteristics of network structure that affect the provisioning of ESS? (iii) How we can address uncertainty to determine the robustness of network information for ecosystem service management? The questions will be answered by usage of methods building on Bayesian Networks. The framework developed will be directly applicable to practitioners of conservation planning and ecosystem services management.
Sweden