Assessment of ecosystems and ecosystem services for sustainable land use management in Latvia

Assessment of ecosystem services has been set a strategically important role in the European Union countries, including it to the EU Biodiversity Strategy to 2020. The EU Biodiversity Strategy determines that “Member States, with the assistance of the Commission, will map and assess the state of ecosystems and their services in their national territory by 2014, assess the economic value of such services, and promote the integration of these values into accounting and reporting systems at EU and national level by 2020”. There is increased attention of science and practice to ecosystem services last decade and it has led also to an increased interest in both the public and private sectors to develop and apply approaches for evaluating ecosystem services in real-world decision-making concerning sustainable land use, including agriculture and renewable energy sector. There are already a lot of decision support systems already which provide advice and knowledge, but they are not yet integrated into everyday decision-making, mainly because they do not readily fit into land use planning and management processes in practice. The aim of the paper is to present and discuss the approach for ecosystem services (ES) assessment for sustainable land use planning and management. There will be presented the case study for two territories in Latvia, where ecosystem services assessment was implemented – biophysical indicators are developed and assessed by experts. The focus is placed on determining appropriate ES and indicators for assessment and way of integration of ES assessment in land use management. This experience can be transferred to agricultural land and presents a different approach for sustain agricultural productivity and resilience.