Ecosystem disservice

Look like this term is creeping into the literature. I found several recent articles using it:


Global Mapping of Ecosystem Disservices: The Unspoken Reality that Nature Sometimes Kills us
Dunn, Biotropica, 42:555-557, 2010

If we are to effectively manage the terrestrial Earth, we need to also manage species, habitats and ecosystems so as to minimize such ‘ecosystem disservices’. I consider what we know about the spatial pattern of one disservice, pathogen prevalence and how changes in habitat influence it. I consider the effects of habitat changes on pathogen prevalence and, consequently, ecosystem disservices. In the end, we need to weigh both the costs and the benefits of particular ecosystems, habitats and species – to consider the bad with the good. Doing so requires that we learn much more about the biota than we currently know.

The Good, the Bad, and the Algae: Perceiving Ecosystem Services and Disservices Generated by Zebra and Quagga Mussels

Limburg et al. Journal of Great Lakes Research, 36: 86-92, 2010.

Given the likely continued influx of invasive species due to human activities, further development of the ecosystem service concept should consider potential “goods” and “bads” of invasives and their influence on ecosystem and social system resiliency.

Balancing nitrogen retention ecosystem services and greenhouse gas disservices at the landscape scale

Burgin et al. Ecological Engineering, in press, 2012

The “water quality maintenance function” of landscape features such as riparian zones has long been recognized as an important ecosystem service. More recently, concerns have emerged about side effects of ecosystem “disservices,” especially greenhouse gas production, associated with landscape approaches to agricultural nutrient management.

Hopping on one leg – The challenge of ecosystem disservices for urban green management

Lyytimaki and Sipila, Urban Forestry and Urban Greening, 8: 309-315, 2009

Here we discuss the concept of ecosystemdisservices from the perspective of northern European urban ecosystems. It is concluded that perceptions about ecosystemdisservices have an increasing influence on how urban green areas are experienced, valued, used, managed and developed.