MAPPING ECOSYSTEM SERVICES SUPPLY: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES IN THE GEO-SPATIAL ANALYSIS

Ecosystem structure and functions provide significant values to the social well-being and human health. The integration of the ecosystem services concept tailor's multiple challenges and opportunities to the investigation processes simultaneously in the scientific approaches andin the environmental management initiatives. In this paper, the focus is defined by some of the main research questions related to the scale in terms of localization of the service production areas and service benefit areas. The spatial identification and analyses of these units has been delineated by the landscape characteristics in the lower Ogosta (Augusta) River watershed (North-western Bulgaria). The geo-spatial methods allow to model a set of opportunities that arise from the empirical analysis associated to the ecosystem services provision and quantitative assessment. The results support the perspectives for integration of the GIS analysis as decision support and management tool in the context of socio-ecological perspectives when economic valuation is transferred at watershed and/or landscape scale.