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The services humankind receives from complex ecosystems
include regulation of water supplies and water quality, main-
tenance of soil fertility, carbon sequestration, climate change
mitigation and enhanced food security, to mention a few. Pro-
vision of these services is dependent upon the functioning of
ecosystems, which is characterized by complex interactions
between organisms and their biological and chemical environ-
ments. The environmental degradation that has occurred in
many parts of the world has a negative impact on such func-
tioning, and can reduce the provision of services on which hu-
man livelihoods depend.
Ecological restoration is increasingly being used to reverse
the environmental degradation caused by human activities.
One of the key objectives of such restoration is to improve the
functioning of degraded ecosystems, to increase both biodi-
versity and the ecosystem services provided to humankind.
The conservation of biodiversity is recognised as important due to the role biodiversity
plays in underpinning many of the ecosystem services which humans depend upon
form their well-being (MA 2005). Furthermore, it is well documented globally that habi-
tat loss is a direct driver of species loss, and one mechanism to bring species diversity
back to a site is through restoration of the ecosystem or habitat (SER 2010). And while
it has been documented that restoration does not necessary achieve the same value
of biodiversity or ecosystem services found in intact ecosystems (Benayas
et al
2009),
there are many good examples of were informed ecological restoration programmes
have been able to deliver biodiversity, including the recovery of threatened species and
ecosystems (Lindenmayer
et al
. In press).
ECOSYSTEM RESTORATION
FOR BIODIVERSITY
CONSERVATION
Although ecological restoration is now being undertaken
throughout the world, evidence regarding the effectiveness of
such activities has been lacking. However, a systematic meta-
analysis of 89 restoration assessments was recently published
in the journal Science, integrating the results obtained from
restoration actions in a wide range of ecosystem types from
throughout the world. Results indicated that ecosystem res-
toration was consistently effective in improving ecosystem
services (Banayas
et al
., 2009).
From the 89 studies, 526 quantitative measures of variables re-
lating to biodiversity and ecosystem services were extracted and
incorporated into a database. The ecosystem services were clas-
sified according to the scheme developed by the Millennium
Ecosystem Assessment (MA, 2005), which distinguishes four
categories: 1) supporting (e.g., nutrient cycling and primary
production), (2) provisioning (e.g., timber, fish, food crops),