Ecosystem services provided by agricultural land in Malta

Abstract

Agricultural systems, engineered for the provision of food, constitute complex social-ecological systems that bring together natural and human capital. Ecosystem services, on which livelihoods and human well-being intrinsically depend, play a critical role in such systems. However, agriculture can also be a driver of environmental degradation and food insecurity, producing externalities that are a result of a series of institutional failures. The benefits of ecosystem services and the costs of such externalities are often not reflected in market prices, leading to misrepresentation of the true value of agroecosystems. In an attempt to explore the interactions between Malta’s biodiversity and different agricultural practices, this study used the ecosystem service approach to design an integrated valuation framework reflecting provision of ecosystem services. The framework was applied to selected Maltese organic and traditionally managed agro-ecosystem case studies. Results show that organic agro-ecosystems provide multiple ecosystem services, indicating synergistic relations between organic farming on the one hand, and biodiversity, on the other. Management practices such as agroforestry were found to support several ecosystem services while soil conservation measures effectively mitigate the risk of soil erosion. While traditional agro-ecosystems may also support some ecosystem services, these involved more trade-offs. Although necessarily narrow in scope because of time and resource limitations, this study provides information on the interactions between farming and biodiversity that should be considered by policy and decision makers. Results confirm that it is possible for agroecosystems to provide food while also continuing to provide multiple ecosystem services and contribute to human well-being.