Abstract
Communities, nations, not-for-profit groups, and some mining, infrastructure, and energy corporations are catching on to the fact that the ecological restoration of degraded ecosystems is vital to their search for sustainability and ecological accountability. The science of restoration ecology can provide the tools and major building blocks necessary to develop a transdisciplinary sustainability science and is a problem-solving toolkit used on the road to global, regional, national, and local sustainability. We discuss a landscape-scale restoration program for the large (155 km²) and heavily polluted Étang de Berre (Berre Lagoon) to illustrate these ideas. This lagoon is situated between Marseille, Salon-de-Provence, and Aix-en-Provence in southern France. We illustrate the use of (a) sequential references, which is a technique from the field of restoration ecology that helps clarify goals and develop consensus among stakeholders and scientists of differing backgrounds; and (b) HMCA (historical multicriteria analysis), which is a variation of MCA that is often used in ecological and environmental economics. We show how to use a HMCA to synthesize ecological, social, and economic criteria across different historical time periods and be applied to a large scale, multifaceted project of this sort when a sequential reference exercise has been performed. Lastly, we note that ecological restoration is the key means for restoring natural capital (RNC) and to simultaneously recover and revitalize social capital. In the ecologically and economically beleaguered and vulnerable area as the one considered here, and indeed many others around the world, the road to sustainability passes through a portal of what we call “RNC thinking.”
Keywords
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Alexander S, Nelson C, Aronson J et al (2011) Opportunities and challenges for ecological restoration within REDD+. Rest Ecol 19(6):683–689
Aronson J, Vallejo R (2006) Challenges for the practice of ecological restoration. In: Van Andel J, Aronson J (eds) Restoration ccology: the new frontier. Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, UK
Aronson J, Dhillion S, Le Floc’h E (1995) On the need to select an ecosystem of reference, however imperfect: a reply to Pickett & Parker. Rest Ecol 3:1–3
Aronson J, Milton SJ, Blignaut JN (eds) (2007) Restoring natural capital: science, business and practice. Island Press, Washington, DC
Aronson J, Blignaut JN, de Groot RS et al (2010) The road to sustainability must bridge three great divides. Annals New York Acad Sci 1185:225–236
Aronson J, Brancalion PHS, Durigan G et al (2011) What role should government regulation play in ecological restoration: ongoing debate in São Paulo State, Brazil. Rest Ecol 19(6):690–695
Bachelard G (1942) L’eau et les rêves. Editions José Corti, Paris, France, p 12
Bell ML, Hobbs BF, Ellis H (2003) The use of multi-criteria decision-making methods in the integrated assessment of climate change: implications for IA practitioners. Socio-Econ Plann Sci 37:289–316
Bellet M-E (1979) Guide archéologique des rives de l’étang de Berre. Édisud, Aix-en Provence, France
Belton V, Stewart TJ (2002) Multi-criteria decision analysis: an integrated approach. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, The Netherlands
Bullock J, Aronson J, Rey Benayas JM et al (2011) Restoration of ecosystem services and biodiversity. Trends Ecol Evol 26:541–549
Clébert J-P, Rouyer J-P (1991) La Durance. Privat, Toulouse, France
Clewell AF, Aronson J (2007) Ecological restoration: principles, values, and structure of an emerging profession. Island Press, Washington, DC
Collomp A (2002) La découverte des gorges du Verdon: Histoire du tourisme et des travaux hydrauliques. Édisud, Aix-en-Provence, France
Costanza R, d’Arge R, de Groot R et al (1997) The value of the world’s ecosystem services and natural capital. Nature 387:253–260
de Groot R, Blignaut J, van der Ploeg S et al (in prep.) Restoration pays: evidence from the Field
Dobes L, Bennett J (2009) Multi-criteria analysis: “good enough” for government work? Agenda 16:7–30
DROS—Dispositif Régional d’Observation Sociale Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (2010) Baromètre social 2009. Les Cah DROS 9:1–16
Egan D, Howell EA (2001) The historical ecology handbook: a restorationist’s guide to reference ecosystems. Island Press, Washington, DC
Elmqvist T, Setälä H, Handel S et al (in prep.) Benefits of restoring ecosystem services in cities
ENSAML—École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Marseille-Luminy (2001) L’étang de Berre: De la mer au lac. Éditions générales du CAUE des Bouches-du-Rhône, Marseille, France
Forman RTT, Gordon M (1986) Landscape ecology. Wiley, New York
Géoportail (2011) Institut Géographique National (IGN), France. http://ww.geoportail.fr. Accessed 10 September, 2011
Hämäläinen RP, Alaja S (2008) The threat of weighting biases in environmental decision analysis. Ecol Econ 68:556–569
Howard AF (1991) A critical look at multiple criteria decision making techniques with reference to forestry applications, Can J For Res 21:1649–1659
Janssen R (2001) On the use of multi-criteria analysis in environmental impact assessment in The Netherlands. J Mult-Crit Decis Anal 10:101–109
Janssen R, van Herwijnen M, Beinat E (2003) DEFINITE case studies and user manual. Institute for Environmental Studies, Vrije University, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Kates RW, Clark WC, Corelle R et al (2000) Sustainability science. Science 292:641–642
MA (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment) (2005) Ecosystems and human well-being: synthesis. Millennium ecosystem assessment series. Island Press and World Resources Institute, Washington. http://www.millenniumassessment.org/. Accessed 10 September, 2011
Maljean-Dubois S, Truilhe-Marengo E (2005) Le conflit entre les pêcheurs de l’étang de Berre et EDF: Quelques remarques à propos des arrêts CJC des 15 juillet et 7 octobre 2004. Droit Environ 131:186–190
Martin-Ortega J, Berbel A (2010) Using multi-criteria analysis to explore non-market monetary values of water quality changes in the context of the Water Framework Directive. Sci Total Environ 408:3990–3997
Meadows DH (1999) Leverage points: places to intervene in a system. Sustainability Institute. http://challenge.bfi.org/reference/PlacesToIntervene.pdf. Accessed 10 September, 2011
Neßhöver C, Aronson J, Blignaut JN et al (2011) Investing in ecological infrastructure. In: Ten Brink P (ed) The economics of ecosystems and biodiversity in national and international policy making. Earthscan, London
Paneque Salgado P, Corral Quintana S, Guimaraes Pereira A et al (2009) Participative multi-criteria analysis for the evaluation of water governance alternatives. A case in the Costa del Sol (Malaga). Ecol Econ 68:990–1005
Papayannis T (2008) Action for culture in Mediterranean wetlands. Med-INA, Athens, Greece. afoutri@med-ina.org. Accessed 10 September, 2011
Rees WE (1995) Cumulative environmental assessment and global change. Environ Impact Assess Rev 15:295–309
Rey Benayas JM, Newton AC, Diaz A, Bullock JM (2009) Enhancement of biodiversity and ecosystem services by ecological restoration: a meta-analysis. Science 325:1121–1124
Salt D, Walker B (2006) Resilience thinking: sustaining ecosystems and people in a changing world. Island Press, Washington, DC
Schuijt K, Brander L (2004) The economic value of the world’s wetlands. Conserving the source of life. WWF Living Waters, Gland, Switzerland
SER (2004) The SER primer on ecological restoration. Society for Ecological Restoration International, Science and Policy Working Group. http://www.ser.org
Sheppard SRJ, Meitner M (2005) Using multi-criteria analysis and visualisation for sustainable forest management planning with stakeholder groups. For Ecol Manage 207:171–187
TEEB Foundations (2010) The economics of ecosystems and biodiversity: ecological and economic foundations. In: Kumar P (ed) An output of TEEB. Earthscan, London
Wang M, Yang J (1998) A multi-criterion experimental comparison of three multi-attribute weight measurement methods. J Mult-Crit Decis Anal 7:340–350
WCED (World Commission on Environment and Development) (1987) Our common future: the Brundtland report. Oxford University Press, New York
White PS, Walker JL (1997) Approximating nature’s variation: selecting and using reference information in restoration ecology. Restor Ecol 5:338–349
Acknowledgments
We warmly thank R. Eugene Turner and Michael P. Weinstein for their helpful comments, and Bérengère Merlot and Elisabeth Le Corre for help with the manuscript and the figures.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2012 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Aronson, J. et al. (2012). Steps Towards Sustainability and Tools for Restoring Natural Capital: Etang de Berre (Southern France) Case Study. In: Weinstein, M., Turner, R. (eds) Sustainability Science. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-3188-6_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-3188-6_6
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-1-4614-3187-9
Online ISBN: 978-1-4614-3188-6
eBook Packages: Business and EconomicsEconomics and Finance (R0)