A Classification of Landscape Services to Support Local Landscape Planning

• Main Authors: María Vallés-Planells, Francisco Galiana, Veerle Van Eetvelde
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Resilience Alliance 2014-03-01
• Series: Ecology and Society
• Subjects: cultural services; ecosystem services; holism; landscape services; spatial pattern; transdiciplinarity
• Online Access: http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol19/iss1/art44/

The ecosystem services approach has been proven successful to measure the contributions of nature and greenery to human well-being. Ecosystems have an effect on quality of life, but landscapes also, as a broader concept, may contribute to people's well-being. The concept of landscape services, compared to ecosystem services, involves the social dimension of landscape and the spatial pattern resulting from both natural and human processes in the provision of benefits for human-well being. Our aim is to develop a classification for landscape services. The proposed typology of services is built on the Common International Classification of Ecosystem Services (CICES) and on a critical review of existing literature on human well-being dimensions, existing ecosystem service classifications, and landscape perception. Three themes of landscape services are defined, each divided into several groups: provisioning, regulation and maintenance, cultural and social life fulfillment, with the latter focusing on health, enjoyment, and personal and social fulfillment. A special emphasis is made on cultural services, which are especially important when applied to landscape and which have received less attention.