Ecosystem Services Indicators
Managed by: Alexander van Oudenhoven The importance of ecosystem services to human well-being calls for the ability to assess the state and trends in ecosystem services. In order to provide information on the availability and use of ecosystem services, ecosystem service indicators (ESI's) are needed. Using clear, consistent, comparable and quantified indicators can assist in the development of ecosystem services models and (other) policy instruments that ensure conservation and sustainable use of ecosystem services. Present frameworks for ESI's are fragmentary and most ecosystem services have few applicable indicators to monitor the potential and actual delivery of services. This section of the Ecosystem Services Partnership website aims to provide an overview of initiatives that describe and apply ESI's. This is very much in line with the aim of the World Resources Insititute (WRI), United Nations Environment Programme-World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Commission for Ecosystem Management (IUCN-CEM). During an international expert workshop on ESI's, organised by the three parties and held in Cambridge from September 22nd - 23rd 2009, it became clear that further collaboration is essential. The workshop report can be downloaded here (NB: 5 Mb, link opens in new window). Among other things, it contains an excercise how to consistently seek for and apply indicators in a framework, as well as recommendations for further (research) actions. Below you will find a short overview of reports on ESI's as well as online available databases / lists of indicators. At the moment they are somewhat dominated by documents / databases of biodiversity indicators, because of the continuous If you have any suggestions that can help to make this list more comprehensive, or if you are interested in becoming more closely involved in the "Indicators" section of the ES-Partnership, please do not hesitate to contact us! Reports
All links will open in new windows, file size between brackets. > Measuring Nature's Benefits (2009, 36 pp., 0.8 Mb) - Christian Layke, World Resources Institute.
Subtitled "A Preliminary Roadmap for Improving Ecosystem Service Indicators" this report provides 1) a compilation of ESI's used in
the MEA (2005) as well as Sub-Global MA's (SGMA), 2) a preliminary assessment of each indicator’s capacity to support policy, measured by “ability to convey information” and the availability of data to apply the indicator 3) a synthesis of key complications and opportunities, and 4) preliminary recommendations for next steps toward improving ecosystem service indicators and data compilations, and their application in decision-making processes. This paper was used as a background paper for the September expert workshop on ESI's at UNEP-WCMC. > Workshop report on Indicators of final ecosystem services for streams (2009, 55 pp., 2 Mb) - Environmental Protection Agency. > Guidance for National Biodiversity Indicator Development and Use (2009, 28 pp., 0,8 Mb) - BIP & UNEP-WCMC
Designed to help the development of biodiversity indicators at the national level (as listed below) for uses such as reporting, policy-making, environmental management, and education. In some cases biodiversity indicators are developed on a ‘one-off ’ basis to meet the needs for a particular study or report, or they can be developed for long-term reporting and decision-making. This guidance can be used for both situations. > Indicator(s) on the Health & Well-being of Communities Directly Dependent on Local Ecosystems - UNEP-WCMC & others.
An initiative under the 2010 Biodiversity Indicators Partnership (BIP), carried out by UNEP-WCMC and the WHO, with support from the Swedish International Biodiversity Programme (SwedBio). This report provides a range of indicators that can linked to human health and well-being. The indicators are in line with the indicators that are described in the previously mentioned BIP report - the report basically is an in-depth look into a category under the Focal Area 4: "Ecosystem integrity and ecosystem goods and services". Databases / lists of ESI's > Biodiversity indicator suite - Biodiversity Indicators Partnership
For each category within the seven focal areas of the BIP a wide range of indicators can be found. > Indicator initiatives database on Biodiversity Indicators Partnership website - National Biodiversity Indicators Portal
Local, regional and national biodiversity indicators initiatives presented in a dropdown menu. | 
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