Journal Article

The supply of multiple ecosystem services requires biodiversity across spatial scales

Jung, Kirsten, Perović, David J., Thiele, Jan, Busch, Verena, Boeddinghaus, Runa S., Tschapka, Marco, Ayasse, Manfred, Steffan-Dewenter, Ingolf, Wells, Konstans, Fischer, Markus, Leimer, Sophia, Steckel, Juliane, Weisser, Wolfgang, Blüthgen, Nico, Kandeler, Ellen, Schöning, Ingo, Westphal, Catrin, Manning, Peter, Wilcke, Wolfgang, Schenk, Noëlle V., Hölzel, Norbert, Weiner, Christiane, Oelmann, Yvonne, Schäfer, Deborah, Neyret, Margot, Boesing, Andrea Larissa, Marhan, Sven, Vogt, Juliane, Rillig, Matthias C., Klaus, Valentin H., Morris, Kathryn, Saiz, Hugo, Neff, Felix, Schloter, Michael, Allan, Eric, Scherer-Lorenzen, Michael, Le Provost, Gaëtane, Kleinebecker, Till, Gossner, Martin M., Peter, Sophie, Prati, Daniel, Penone, Caterina, Bolliger, Ralph, Müller, Sandra, Werner, Michael, Schrumpf, Marion

2023

Overview

The impact of local biodiversity loss on ecosystem functioning is well established, but the role of larger-scale biodiversity dynamics in the delivery of ecosystem services remains poorly understood. Here we address this gap using a comprehensive dataset describing the supply of 16 cultural, regulating and provisioning ecosystem services in 150 European agricultural grassland plots, and detailed multi-scale data on land use and plant diversity. After controlling for land-use and abiotic factors, we show that both plot-level and surrounding plant diversity play an important role in the supply of cultural and aboveground regulating ecosystem services. In contrast, provisioning and belowground regulating ecosystem services are more strongly driven by field-level management and abiotic factors. Structural equation models revealed that surrounding plant diversity promotes ecosystem services both directly, probably by fostering the spill-over of ecosystem service providers from surrounding areas, and indirectly, by maintaining plot-level diversity. By influencing the ecosystem services that local stakeholders prioritized, biodiversity at different scales was also shown to positively influence a wide range of stakeholder groups. These results provide a comprehensive picture of which ecosystem services rely most strongly on biodiversity, and the respective scales of biodiversity that drive these services. This key information is required for the upscaling of biodiversity–ecosystem service relationships, and the informed management of biodiversity within agricultural landscapes. The authors test whether spatial scale (plot, local and landscape) affects the supply of various ecosystem services in grasslands, finding that some services are predicted by plot-level properties while others depend more on landscape-level management.

• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group UK,Nature Publishing Group,Nature
• Subject: 704/158/2453 / 704/158/2456 / 704/158/2458 / 704/158/670 / Abiotic factors / Agricultural ecosystems / Agricultural land / Agriculture - methods / Biodiversity / Biodiversity loss / Biological and Physical Anthropology / Biomedical and Life Sciences / Ecological function / Ecology / Ecosystem / Ecosystem services / Ecosystems / Environmental Sciences / Evolutionary Biology / Grasslands / Land use / Landscape / Life Sciences / Multivariate statistical analysis / Paleontology / Plant diversity / Plants / Provisioning / Zoology