ICSU ROAP: Research on Ecosystem Approach in Asia and the Pacific

1
ICSU (ROAP) Research on Ecosystem Approach in
Asia and the Pacific Muhamad Awang, FASc

Dept. of Env. Sciences,

Universiti Putra Malaysia awang_at_env.upm.edu.my 1
st Meeting ICSU (ROAP) Scientific Planning Group
on Ecosystem Approach
July 16-17 Kuala Lumpur
2
Functional Diversity Ecosystem Functioning and
environmental filter (Diaz, et al., (2007)
Global Change Drivers climate, land
use/disturbance regime, atmospheric composition,
biotic exchanges
1
Ecosystem services food and shelter, climate and
water regulation, soil fertility, detoxification,
recreation, cultural values, etc.
Functional diversity value, range, and relative
abundance of traits
2
2
2
2
Ecosystem processes primary production, trophic
level, nutrient cycling, water dynamics,
resilience, resistance, etc
3
3
Note Asia-Pacific Ecosystems highly complex and
varied in nature (desert to tropical moist
forests)
3
Earth System
Land Systems

Aquatic systems
Ecological Systems
Social Systems
Disturbances
Ecosystem services
Population, social/economic structure,
political/institutional regimes, culture,
religion and technology
Decision making
Biogeochemistry, Biodiversity, water, air and soil
Land use and Management
Critical pathway of change Vulnerability and
resilience of land systems Effective governance
for sustainability Dynamic of land systems
Consequence of land change Integrating analysis
and modeling for land/aquatic sustainability
Ojima et al., 2007
4
Dynamic Land Transitions
Land cover (Biophysical Control)
Land Use (Human Control)
Decision Making Choices (knowledge, values,
preferences) and their socio-economic, political,
religion and cultural context
Social Systems Population, Social/economic
structure, political/institutional regimes,
culture and technology
Ecological systems (Biogeochemistry,
Biodiversity, water, air, soil)
Ecosystem Goods and services clear air, clean
water, waste recycling, food/fiber/fuel,
recreation
Ecological Challenges pollution, diseases,
food/fibre/fuel shortages, overcrowding, clean
water supply
Social Challenges poverty, conflict, social
justice, migration, consumption, health
5

• Challenges on Terrestrial and Marine/aquatic
  Ecosystems (Mooney and Canadel, 2001 Steffen et
  al. 2004)
• Changes in the composition of the atmosphere
• Changes in global and regional climate
• Habitat destruction and land cover change
• Increased in the amount of reactive nitrogen
  compounds in the biosphere
• Increases in species extinction rates
• Increases in the number and impacts of exotic
  invasive species

6

• Issues/Challenges
• Global change has the potential to significantly
  alter the structure and functioning of
  terrestrial/marine ecosystems
• Describing and understanding the interactive
  physical, chemical, biological, and
  socio-economic processes that regulate the total
  earth system and the changes that are occurring
  in the system vital/critical
• The overarching goals of GCTE (Pitelka et al.,
  2007)
• To predict the effects of changes in climate,
  atmospheric composition, and land use on
  terrestrial ecosystems
• To determine how these effects lead to feedbacks
  to the atmosphere and physical climate system

7

• Issues/Challenges (cont.)
• How ecosystem structure would respond to a
  changing climate without simultaneously
  considering effects ecosystem physiology
• The interaction between biodiversity and
  ecosystem functioning due to habitat loss and
  fragmentation species and functional traits in
  maintaining biogeochemical cycles
• Changes in the atmospheric CO2 concentrations in
  the 21st century in concert with changes in
  temperature, nitrogen deposition, precipitation,
  and other aspects of global change
• Interactive effects among multiple disturbances
  may not be additive (?) merit further
  investigation in the next generation of
  manipulative and modeling experiments

8

• Issues/Challenges (cont.)
• Relative response of individual perturbations and
  multiple global change drivers in relation to
  terrestrial ecosystems responses
• The effects of urbanization on biogeochemistry
  as an emerging area of critical importance in
  quantifying impacts of land use and land cover
  change, as well as the dynamics of coupled human
  and natural systems
• Effects of rapid expansions of exotic species on
  structure and function of terrestrial and
  freshwater ecosystems functional changes due to
  species loss (productivity, decomposition rates,
  nutrient cycling, resistance and resilience to
  perturbations

9

• Key effects and major concern
• Potential for non-linearities in response of
  ecosystems or other components of the Earth
  Systems
• Adjustments in the ranges in plant and animal
  species, community and biome
• The expected rate of global/climate change,
  whether and which species will be able to migrate
  fast enough to keep pace with the changing
  climate question of conservation of species and
  carbon balance/budget of the ecosystems
• Predicting the future migration of plant/animal
  species understand how fire regimes affect the
  ecosystem structure and functioning

10

• Major concerns (cont.)
• Agro-ecology and production ecosystems deals with
  effects of global change on the production of
  food as key component in global food security
• The role of agricultural pests in reducing food
  production and how climate change is likely to
  alter pest-plant dynamics
• Integration of food/fiber production and
  biogeochemistrey to fully account for plant-soil
  feedback, soil carbon sequestration under
  different climate and management scenarios

11

• The overall research objectives (Ojima et al.
  2007)
• To identify the agents, structure and nature of
  change in coupled socio-environmental systems on
  land and quantify their effects on the coupled
  system
• To assess how the provision of ecosystem services
  is affected by the changes in the coupled
  socio-environmental systems
• To identify the character and dynamics of
  vulnerable and sustainable coupled
  socio-environmental LAND/terrestrial and
  MARINE/aquatic-SYSTEMS to interacting
  perturbations, including climate change

12

• Research Framework
• Dynamic of Land/Marine systems
• Research questions how does globalization and
  population change affect regional and local
  land-use decisions and practices ?
• How do changes in land management decisions and
  practices affect biogeochemistry, biodiversity,
  biophysical properties, and disturbance regimes
  of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems?
• How do the atmospheric, biogeochemical and
  biophysical dimensions of global/regional change
  affect ecosystem structure and function?

13

• Research Framework (cont.)
• 2. Consequences of Land-system change
• Research Questions
• What are the critical feedbacks from changes in
  ecosystems to the coupled Earth System?
• How do changes in ecosystem structure and
  functioning affect the delivery of ecosystem
  services?
• How can ecosystem services be linked to human
  well-being?
• How do people respond to changes in ecosystem
  service provision, considering the various scales
  and contexts of decision making?

14

• Research Framewwork (cont.)
• 3. Integrating Analysis and modeling for land
  sustainability
• Research Questions
• What are the critical pathways of changes in
  LAND-SYSTEMs?
• How do the vulnerability and resilience of
  LAND-SYSTEMS to hazards and disturbances vary due
  to changes in human and environment interactions?
• Which institutions and policies enhance
  land/marine sustainability?

15

• Implementation Strategies
• be place-based research studies
• b) require the establishment of interdisciplinary
  teams
• c) be cognizant of the need to be able to scale
  up and down and across disciplines, and
• d) define the relationship of the research to the
  broader coupled human-environmental framework

16

• Research Activities should include
• Case studies, manipulative studies and
  comparative
• Studies
• Networks of experimental and case studies across
  gradient of land/aquatic/marine systems
• Long-term observations/experiments (remote
  sensing, sites, cross-site analysis)
• Process models (e.g., vegetation/ecosystem,
  agro-ecosystem, agent-based models)
• Land-use meta analyses
• Integrated analytical tools, not only models but
  also advances in field techniques
• Decision making models
• Integrated regional studies/interdisciplinary
  data base development and archival systems

17
Conclusions Linkages between perturbation and
system response encapsulated in the concept of
vulnerability (GLP, 2005)
Hazard Perturbation stressor
EXPOSURE
COUPLED SYSTEM
COPING/RESPONSE
BEYOND SYSTEM CONSEQUENCE