Mapping Marine Ecosystem Service Values and Threats

Abstract

"Recognizing that local knowledge and values should play a prominent role in natural resource decision-making, we tested a semi-structured interview protocol to solicit the verbal articulation, spatial identification and a quantitative measure of local monetary values, non-monetary values and threat intensity associated with marine ecosystem services. Ecosystem services are the ecological processes through which nature provides benefits to people. Interviewees identified and characterized a wide range of ways in which they value marine ecosystems in the Regional District of Mount Waddington in British Columbia, Canada. This research is intended to inform an ongoing marine spatial planning process in this region. A total of 30 semi-structured interviews were conducted based on non-proportional quota sampling to target interviewees with a variety of marine-related occupations who live across the district. There was significant spatial overlap among all three pair-wise comparisons of monetary values, non-monetary values, and threat intensity values. Employment in salmon aquaculture correlated with the perception that the ocean does not face environmental threat associated with this industry. A minority of respondents refused to participate in the spatial and quantitative components of this research, yet all verbally identified the importance of marine ecosystems. The results of this research and the methods could complement deliberative processes to enable decision makers to more fully consider stakeholder’s non-monetary values and threats associated with ecosystem services."