HYDROLOGICAL ECOSYSTEM SERVICES
Bringing spatial interactions among freshwater ecosystem services into water resource management from a perspective of watershed processes
Researchers
Jingyu Lin Jinliang Huang Brett Bryan Yuzhen Zhang
Summary
Managing watershed ecosystems to provide freshwater ecosystem services in the face of dual pressures from climate and land-use changes is a pressing challenge for science and policy. Freshwater resource management boundaries often mismatch with watershed ecosystem systems, which can lead to problems such as security of local/regional drinking water. As such, exploring spatial interactions among freshwater ecosystem services and thereby bringing the spatial optimization reallocation mechanisms into integrated water resource management is meaningful and practical. The Jiulong River Watershed (JRW), a subtropical coastal watershed in Southeast China that is experiencing coupled nature-human disturbances, is selected as a case study for its role in maintaining regional water safety. We propose a framework WPSISM (Watershed Processes - Spatial Interactions -Systematic Management) for incorporating ecosystem services concept into integrated water resource management with the aid of in-situ observation, spatial statistics, watershed modelling and social-ecological network analysis. We first explore the influencing mechanisms of watershed ecological processes on the provision of freshwater ecosystem services and the underlying regulation services including soil-water retention and water quality purification. Then, we characterize the spatial interactions among the above-mentioned freshwater ecosystem services, such as trade-off and synergies, and further identify the source, pathway, sink and use regions to quantify freshwater ecosystem services flows. We finally develop an ecosystem services based water resource management strategies at landscape and watershed scales for sustainable utilization of water resource. We do hope this research could add values to science-based management and provide scientific support for Freshwater Reserves, River Chiefs and scheme of Comprehensive Improvements in the Jiulong River watershed–Xiamen Bay system.