Call for Papers: Settings Concepts and Methods for Ecosystem Service Assessments

Living Special Issue opened: 2014 - ongoing

Guest Editors / Edited by:
IALE-D working group „Ecosystem Services"
coordinator: Marion Kruse, Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA), Norway Website

[Current published papers of this Living Special Issue]

We invite contributions to a special issue on concepts and methods for ecosystem service assessments. As a collaborative of event of the IALE-D Working group Ecosystem Services and the Ecosystem Services Partnership ESP, a joint Workshop on Indication, Integration and Application of Ecosystem Services in Decision Making was held in Kiel in May 2013. Following this event there have been some very constructive discussions about a special issue on “Concepts and Methods for Ecosystem Service Assessments”. The result on hand is a general acceptance of the plans from the editorial board of the IALE-D online journal “Landscape Online” and a huge support by workshop participants. Therefore, the submission procedure has been initiated, and we look forward to receiving your contributions.

The general objectives of this Special Topic with the increasing popularity of the ecosystem service approach in many universities, research institutions and administrations, various works have to be done in parallel at several places. To date, lack of collaboration and standards has resulted in extremely low compatibility among different approaches. Therefore, an information base on ecosystem service quantification concepts and methodologies will be extremely helpful for all scientists and practitioners. We are now establishing a respective collection of information in a „living“ special issue. It can be called “living” because the contributions can be published continuously and fast, without deadlines and waiting times. Furthermore it is possible to modify papers by new editions or new papers if the methodology has been improved. And finally this issue does not duplicate the works of other journals because the focus is strictly put on methodology.

Of course, this special issue will also be open for colleagues who did not participate in the Kiel workshop in May 2013. Therefore we encourgage you to also inform your colleagues and friends about this activity of IALE and the ESP working groups on „Ecosystem Service Indicators“, „Ecosystem Service Cascade“ and „Application of Ecosystem Services in Planning and Management“. If you are planning to write a paper, please provide a short description ofyour paper in order to prepare the organization of the special edition. We are looking forward to your replies and paper submissions.

By Felix Müller (IALE-D, ESP) and the editorial group. (Summer 2013)

If authors want their manuscript considered for this special issues please mention during the submission process in the cover letter using the text field Comments for the Editor.