Describe the ecosystem services humans rely on and explain how resource use such as forestry, fishing and agriculture affects Tasmanian ecosystems.

What this dot point is asking

This dot point asks you to describe the benefits people gain from ecosystems, called ecosystem services, and to explain how using natural resources changes those ecosystems. You should classify ecosystem services, distinguish renewable from non-renewable resources, and use Tasmanian examples such as forestry, fishing and farming to show both the benefits and the impacts of resource use.

What ecosystem services are

Ecosystem services are the goods and benefits that healthy ecosystems provide to people, often for free. They are usually grouped into four categories.

• Provisioning services are tangible products such as timber, fish, fresh water and crops.
• Regulating services control natural processes, such as forests storing carbon, wetlands filtering water, and vegetation reducing flooding and erosion.
• Supporting services underpin all the others, such as photosynthesis, soil formation and nutrient cycling.
• Cultural services are non-material benefits such as recreation, tourism, spiritual value and the cultural identity many Tasmanians draw from wild places.

Because many of these services are not bought and sold, their value is easy to overlook until they are lost.

Renewable and non-renewable resources

A renewable resource can replenish itself within a human timescale if it is not used too fast, such as timber, fish stocks, fresh water and solar energy. A non-renewable resource exists in a fixed amount or forms far too slowly to replace, such as the minerals mined on Tasmania's west coast and fossil fuels. The central challenge is that even renewable resources behave like non-renewable ones if they are harvested faster than they can recover.

Forestry in Tasmania

Tasmania's forests provide timber, jobs and regional income, and they also deliver major regulating and supporting services by storing carbon, protecting catchments and sheltering biodiversity. Native-forest logging, especially clear-felling, can reduce habitat for species such as the swift parrot and the masked owl, increase erosion and change water flows. Plantations and regrowth can restore some services, but a young plantation does not match the structural complexity or carbon store of an old-growth forest. Sustainable forestry tries to balance timber yield against the long-term services the forest provides.

Fisheries

Tasmanian fisheries, including rock lobster, abalone and aquaculture such as Atlantic salmon, are economically important. Wild fisheries can be overharvested if catch exceeds the rate at which stocks reproduce, reducing the resource and harming the wider food web. Salmon aquaculture provides food and jobs but can affect water quality, the seabed and surrounding marine life if nutrient waste is not managed, showing how a provisioning service can erode regulating and supporting services.

Agriculture

Farming in regions such as the Midlands and the north-west supplies food and supports communities. Clearing native vegetation for crops and pasture reduces habitat and biodiversity, while heavy fertiliser and irrigation can degrade soil and pollute waterways. Good practice, such as retaining shelterbelts and managing runoff, helps farmland keep delivering food while protecting the supporting services of soil and water.

Bringing it together

To answer this dot point well, define ecosystem services and classify them into the four groups, distinguish renewable from non-renewable resources, and then use Tasmanian examples of forestry, fisheries and agriculture to explain how using resources both benefits society and impacts the ecosystems that supply those benefits.