Establishment of Priority Forest Areas Based on Hydrological Ecosystem Services in Northern Vietnam

Abstract

Ecosystem services provide various benefits to human beings, but are considered to be free of cost.To protect ecosystems in an economically sustainable way, several developing countries have adopted a policy known as the Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) that compensates upstream services with monetary incentives collected from service users. Vietnam is one of the countries that have enacted a nationwide PES policy. However, the policy in Vietnam requires further development in order to evaluate the spatial priority zones based on the quantification of ecosystem services.To obtain a recent and high-quality land cover map, we first classified the land cover in the Da River basin, in northern Vietnam, using Landsat dataset. We then applied a water balance theory and an USLE equation to assess hydrological ecosystem services concerning water supply and sediment retention. Following the assessment, we identified the priority areas for hydrological ecosystem services exclusively for forest environments.We found that the quantity and distribution of services from forests varied, due to the topography, climate, and land cover. According to a quantile distribution, Mt. Phu Luong, Mt. Fansipan, and Hoang Lien National Park were evaluated as high service areas in terms of both water yield and sediment retention.As a result, this assessment method can help construct spatial priority zones concerning ecosystem service distribution, and can also contribute to benefit sharing by indicating which forest and landowners require compensation. PU - The Korea Society of Environmental Restoration Technology