Elsevier

Ecosystem Services

Volume 17, February 2016, Pages 40-42
Ecosystem Services

Soil stewardship as a nexus between Ecosystem Services and One Health

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoser.2015.11.008Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Overlap between Ecosystem Services and One Health presents valuable opportunities.

  • Soil stewardship proposed as a nexus for synergistic outcomes.

  • Greater benefits for resilience and health in socio-ecological systems.

  • Potential research avenues and positive examples are presented.

Abstract

We highlight the overlap in Ecosystem Services frameworks and the developing One Health approach, and assert that better integration and communication between these could provide a platform for synergistic research with greater benefits for resilience and health in socioecological systems. Furthermore, we propose that soil stewardship could act as the nexus for such integration and present potential research avenues with existing positive examples.

Section snippets

Separate concepts

Change and intensification of land management has resulted in degradation of the structure, status and functions of our landscapes (Foley et al., 2005, Jones et al., 2013). Agricultural activity, in particular, has led to depleted levels of natural capital and to the homogenisation of biodiversity and landscapes. The concerns over such widespread environmental change were a major stimulus for the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. The Ecosystem Services framework, which this landmark assessment

Overlap and nexus

One Health shares characteristics with other more holistic approaches to land management (e.g. biological agriculture) but it has broader applications beyond the physical, biological and chemical sciences, incorporating socio-ecological, cultural and economic elements (Zinsstag et al., 2011). It has a vision for interdisciplinary education between medical/veterinary schools and schools of public health and the environment, and, as with the Ecosystem Services framework, there is focus on food

Research avenues

A synergy between these approaches would benefit from a consolidation of relevant knowledge from the large body of existing literature, following which research gaps, or areas lacking in studies, could also be identified systematically. Studies examining the effects of land management and its change on a range of ecosystem services are becoming familiar, but those making links to animal, human and ecosystem health are less abundant (e.g. Rhodes et al., 2013). We would highlight four broad areas

Positive examples

As greater awareness of and insight into relationships between soil and health develops (Sandifer et al., 2015, Oliver and Gregory, 2015) positive examples emerge. Van Elsas et al. (2012) tested whether and how microbial diversity might hinder pathogen establishment in soil. It was shown that increased diversity of the soil microbial community controlled invasion by an E. coli strain (van Elsas et al., 2012), suggesting that soil stewardship practices promoting soil biodiversity could aid

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