GIS-gestützte Kartierung und Quantifizierung von Ökosystemleistungen: Untersucht am Beispiel wertvoller Biotope des Osterzgebirges.

Ecosystem services provide a promising approach to enforce and harmonize nature protection and sustainable resource use. The present paper describes methods and results of GIS-based assessment and mapping of ecosystem services in the Osterzgebirge, a mountain range along the Czech-German border. The assessment focuses on five ecologically valuable biotope types typical for the area: mountain meadows, natural forests, peat bogs, natural streams and agricultural clearance cairns (stone heaps that have been accumulated to enable tillage in past centuries), altogether covering 1,285ha on the German side and 7,246ha on the Czech side. The paper presents and discusses the assessment of four particular ecosystem services, namely the provision of wood and timber, the provision of hay, carbon fixation, and the regulation of flood events. First, suitable indicators have been defined. Second, the physical performance and its potentials have been identified. In the third place, the benefits and values have been derived. Tangible results have been acquired in the form of a transborder case study. The annual yields include 22,000m³ of timber resp. firewood and 127,000dt of hay with a market value of about 0.5m €. For the other two ecosystem services, the calculations identified 6m t of carbon storage and 0.5m m³ flood water reserve, which equals to about 1.35m €. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]