Analyzing the impact of land use change on ecosystem service value in the main watersheds of Morocco

Valuation of ecosystem services is one of the robust techniques used to examine impacts of land use change. Estimating the impact of land use change on ecosystem service value has been rarely attempted at the national level, especially in North Africa and the Middle East. This study used the benefit transfer method to evaluate the impacts of land use change on ecosystem service values at both the national and basin scales in Morocco between 1992 and 2015. The European Space Agency Climate Change Initiative land cover maps and global value coefficients were used as data for this study. The results showed an increase in all the land use categories except grassland and bare areas with urban areas having the highest gain at 91% over 23 years. This caused an increase in the total ecosystem service value at 5.1 billion (2007 US$) representing 4.9% and further increased supporting services at 44%, provisioning services at 28%, cultural services at 17% and regulating services at 11%. Regulating services are threatened by agriculture expansion and urbanization; hence, intervention strategies such as conservation of natural ecosystems and sustainable management of agriculture should be implemented at targeted basins in order to improve these services.