Ecosystem services

What are the 4 main types of services an ecosystem can provide?

Supporting services, Provisional services, Cultural services, Regulating services

1. What is a supporting service?

2. Provide two examples.

1. The processes and functions that provide the foundations of the ecosystem and contribute to its overall health and stability.

2. Processes may include nutrient cycling and primary production (living organisms convert inorganic compounds into organic matter through photosynthesis or chemosynthesis).  

1. What is a provisioning service?

2. Provide three examples.

1. Tangible products that are harvested or extracted from ecosystems which directly contribute to the wellbeing of human populations.

2. Products may include food resources (crops, fish), freshwater ecosystems supply water ( drinking, irrigation and industrial processes), medicine (7000 compounds used in western medicine derive from plants with a retail value of $43 billion USD, the rosy periwinkle found in Madagascar provide an antitumor agent with 99% chance of remission for lymphocytic leukaemia cases).

1. What is a cultural service?

2. Provide some examples.

1. Providing cultural spaces for recreation and tourism.

2. Cultural practices and traditions, mental health, inspiring art, literature and scientific discovery (Vincent Van Gogh’s ‘Wheatfield with Cypresses’ directly inspired by a French ecosystem).

1. What is a regulating service?

2. Provide some examples.

1. Contribute to the balance, stability, resilience and health of ecosystems.

2. Forests and oceans are key regulators of climate change, wetlands and mangroves can act as natural buffers to flooding or storm surges and biodiversity can regulate pest populations.