ABSTRACT

Ecosystem services are far from uniformly implemented on a systemic basis, often with the new language used to obscure perpetuation of a blinkered approach to management of services in isolation. In operational contexts, there will always be a central driving policy or commercial consideration favouring a particular ecosystem service, but this service can be conceived and applied as 'anchor services' around which outcomes across a spectrum of linked ecosystem services can be optimized. Some existing environmental management and economic tools can be adapted to incorporate a systemic assessment framework, accelerating mainstream uptake of ecosystem services without need for legislative reform. Application of the ecosystem services perspective to socio-environmental challenges can increase human security and well-being by reframing solutions on the protection and regeneration of ecosystems and the socio-economic benefits they provide. The familiar contemporary perception of the goal of sustainable development as slowing or halting human pressure on supportive ecosystems is wholly inadequate.