Part 4
Table 3 - Total Acreages by Land Cover Class in the Puyallup River Watershed
Identification of Ecosystem Services and Valuation of Land Cover Identification of Ecosystem Services The spatial distribution of goods and services produced in a region’s economy can be mapped across the landscape. Mapping goods and services provided by factories, restaurants, schools and businesses provides a view of the economy of that region. For example, retail, residential and industrial areas occur in different parts of the landscape. The economic value of these goods, services, housing and industry can also be estimated from market or appraisal values. The distribution of ecosystem services throughout the Puyallup Watershed is similar. Each land cover class, from wetland to mature forest to agricultural field, provides economically valuable goods and services. For example, a wetland provides ecosystem services such as flood risk reduction, biodiversity, climate
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regulation and soil formation. Eelgrass provides shoreline stabilization and climate regulation, but not soil formation. Figure 11 illustrates how ecosystem services are “stacked” upon the landscape, in the Willamette Basin in Oregon. The first layer, “land cover,” depicts the land cover classes providing ecosystem services. Some land cover classes produce both flood risk reduction and carbon sequestration, while others produce only flood risk reduction. Note that biodiversity is concentrated in one half of the basin, so these areas are critical to a biodiversity strategy.
The Puyallup River Watershed: An Ecological Economic Characterization