Mapping Environmental Services in Highland Guatemala

This paper uses data from Guatemala to
map areas that are important for the provision of indirect
ecosystem services, services whose benefits are enjoyed at
some distance from the ecosystem that provides them, such as
watershed services (enjoyed downstream) or biodiversity
conservation (enjoyed globally). These services are usually
externalities from the perspective of land users, and so
tend to be under-provided. Mapping the areas that supply
such services links the supply and demand of ecosystem
services in a spatially explicit way, allows the
identification and prioritization of areas of conservation interest.