MEASUREMENT OF ECOSYSTEM INTEGRITY
CRINA DACINIA PETRESCU, MIRCEA NASTASE, CRISTINA POPA
ABSTRACT. – Measurement of ecosystem integrity. Partial and totally exclusive decision alternative, intense and increasing public pressure for rapid and significant changes, important costs for certain groups, technical, ecological, and social uncertainties and repercussions on different sectors feature the current issues to be addressed in nature conservation. Within this framework, clear definition of objectives becomes a key requirement for ecosystem management. This requirement is conditioned by the measurement possibilities of ecosystem integrity, since the maintenance of i tis the general goal of nature conservation. On the other hand, the ecosystem notion is burdened by bias do to the low precision in spatial and temporal delimitation of ecosystems, fact that creates difficulties in the establishment of indicators and projection of feasible monitoring systems. The paper aims to analyze the progresses made in this direction and to assess the possibility to use different indicators in ecosystem management. In this respect it identifies and discusses a number of discourses in the definition of ecological integrity that are different by how they recognize the role of science and how they conceptualize the people-ecosystem relations and which could be relevant for creating a system of indicators.
Keywords: nature conservation, ecosystem management, ecosystem integrity, indicators.
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