Ecosystem Services in Coastal Zone for Sustainable Development: The Gulf of Finland and Saint Petersburg

Abstract

Coastal zone contains a rich diversity of ecosystems which supply various ecosystem services that essential for the sustainable development, keeping the balance of socioeconomic and environmental processes. Simultaneously, however, coastal zone is exposed by continuous anthropological activities, such as constructions along the shore or water pollution from the city which could lead on to the eutrophication and hypoxia in hydrosphere. With increasing population of waterfront cities, coastal environment has been changing rapidly, thereby ICZM (Integrated Coastal Zone Management) and clarification of interests between ecosystem services and sustainable development is required. The Gulf of Finland forms a complex ecosystem between freshwater and sea water, and at its coastal zones, obviously, owned even more intricate space with an ebb tide and a high tide. Every year the city of SaintPetersburg, which is situated at the eastern part of the Gulf of Finland is expanding, more and more people are moving to this city, and new constructions is carrying out including the Krestovsky Stadium, which was opened in 2017 for the FIFA Confederations Cup, Passenger Port and its excavation work of seabed, and Saint Petersburg Flood Prevention Facility Complex (dam). Confronting with this swift transition of ecosystem is a crucial matter for every hierarchic class of biota, as well as human-beings, because they formed the basis of the ecosystem services, which are essential for the sustainable development. This research aims to illustrate the connections between ecosystem services and sustainable development by exemplifying the actual data as area studies of the Gulf of Finland in aspects of ICZM and TEEB (The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity).

-References- -R. Kerry Turner, Marije Schaafsma, (2015), Coastal Zone Ecosystem Services pp.167-172, Springer -Ruben Kosyan, (2017), The Diversity of Russian Estuaries and Lagoons Exposed to Human Influence pp. 191-222, Springer