University of Oulu

Janne Alahuhta, Terhi Ala-Hulkko, Helena Tukiainen, Laura Purola, Anu Akujärvi, Raino Lampinen, Jan Hjort, The role of geodiversity in providing ecosystem services at broad scales, Ecological Indicators, Volume 91, 2018, Pages 47-56, ISSN 1470-160X, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2018.03.068

The role of geodiversity in providing ecosystem services at broad scales

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Author: Alahuhta, Janne1,2; Ala-Hulkko, Terhi1; Tukiainen, Helena1;
Organizations: 1University of Oulu, Geography Research Unit, P.O. Box 3000, FI-90014, Finland
2Finnish Environment Institute, Freshwater Centre, University of Oulu, P.O. Box 413, FI-90014, Finland
3Finnish Environment Institute, Natural Environment Centre, P.O. Box 140, FI-00251 Helsinki, Finland
4Finnish Museum of Natural History, Botany Unit, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 7, FI-00014, Finland
Format: article
Version: accepted version
Access: open
Online Access: PDF Full Text (PDF, 1 MB)
Persistent link: http://urn.fi/urn:nbn:fi-fe2018042619160
Language: English
Published: Elsevier, 2018
Publish Date: 2020-04-06
Description:

Abstract

Mapping of ecosystem services (ESs) provide valuable information on the geographical variation of ESs and their relation to overall diversity. Although the relationship between biodiversity and ESs has been intensively explored, little is known how geodiversity (i.e., variety of geological, geomorphological and soil features) is associated with different ESs. We studied 1) the spatial variation of geodiversity and biodiversity in relation to six ESs (i.e., forest carbon budget, potential supply of groundwater, milk and meat production, crop production, amount of free-time residences and nationally valuable landscapes) using variation partitioning (VP), and 2) the spatial overlap between geodiversity and biodiversity and ESs using generalized additive models (GAM) in 1006 intensively surveyed grid cells of 100 km² located across Finland. In the VP, biodiversity independently explained more of the variation than geodiversity for majority of the ESs. However, shared explanation ability of biodiversity and geodiversity was considerable for majority of ESs (forest carbon budget: 41.3%, crop production: 15.0%, free-time residences: 15.2% and valuable landscapes: 7.3%), often exceeding that of both independent contributions. GAMs indicated that increase in both biodiversity and geodiversity enhances forest carbon budget (D2 = 66.8% and 12.4%, respectively), potential production of groundwater (8.3% and 0.1%), crop production (35.7% and 8.9%), free-time residences (40.0% and 7.9%) and valuable landscapes (11.6% and 6.9%). However, the positive relationship between diversity and ESs levelled off for many of the ESs. Our findings suggest that geodiversity is an important complementing factor in explaining spatial variation of the ESs in high-latitude regions. We also found dominantly synergic effects between abiotic diversity and ESs. Thus, our study results highlight the need to more deeply incorporate abiotic diversity into ESs research. Environmental conservation and management would benefit from the more comprehensive integration of geodiversity to ESs research along with the changing environmental conditions of future decades.

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Series: Ecological indicators
ISSN: 1470-160X
ISSN-E: 1872-7034
ISSN-L: 1470-160X
Volume: 91
Pages: 47 - 56
DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolind.2018.03.068
OADOI: https://oadoi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2018.03.068
Type of Publication: A1 Journal article – refereed
Field of Science: 1171 Geosciences
Subjects:
Funding: HT was supported by Kone Foundation and JH by the Academy of Finland (Project number 285040).
Academy of Finland Grant Number: 285040
Detailed Information: 285040 (Academy of Finland Funding decision)
Copyright information: © 2018 This manuscript version is made available under the CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 license http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.
  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/