Trade-offs and synergies between biodiversity and ecosystem services in restored, reforested, abandoned, and energy-producing peatlands

Abstract

There is a need to optimize the use of peatlands to simultaneously reach the biodiversity, environmental goals and the economic needs. Besides raw material timber and peat, peatlands provide a variety of valuable services, such as biodiversity, C sequestration and hydrological control. High pressure is targeted to these ecosystems by e.g. forest, bioenergy and peat industries. In Finland, a country with the highest percentage cover of peatlands in the world (30% of total land area, almost 10 mill. ha), about 60% of peatland area has been drained for forestry. This had led to the degradation of biodiversity, environmental loading to watercourses, and emission of greenhouse gases (GHG). We used empirical country-wide spatial data 1) to estimate and predict the impact of seven peatland uses on the biodiversity, GHG balances and environmental loading to watercourses, and 2) to numerically optimize cost efficient land uses so that benefits from biodiversity and ecosystem services are safeguarded. We show that there is no simple answer to the optimization of peatland uses due to the numerous trade-offs between biodiversity, ecosystem services and monetary value. The outcome depends on the level of environmental constraints, set monetary targets and the time frame of evaluation. Selection between multitude of options requires continuous contact between research, administration, planning, and other relevant stakeholders. We will demonstrate a multicriteria decision support tool that visualises the trade-offs and was piloted in a real planning case concerning peatland use.