Within the context of an ecosystem assessment, scenarios can be employed in a variety of ways. In this study we have examined two of them: scenarios as a framework for deliberation, and scenarios as analytical products. The outcomes of this work can help us answer the overarching question that has framed this study, namely: ‘how can such possible futures help us to understand, manage and communicate the consequences of changes in ecosystem services?’
In this study we have sought to understand better how the UK NEA scenarios can be used to
facilitate and stimulate discussion about the future. It has been argued that scenarios are not simply descriptions of some possible future, but devices that can be used to explore new ideas, challenge assumptions, and help generate new expectations and goals. The evidence that we have collected from our interaction with stakeholders suggests that the UK NEA scenarios are capable of doing this. The results of the engagement with different stakeholder groups showed that the UK NEA scenarios were to be both plausible and relevant to their concerns. They also appeared to have significant potential as tools for developing dialogues between people with differing interests and perspectives. The work showed that these deliberative activities were two-way: the contributions of stakeholders enriched the scenarios and at the same time allowed us to see new perspectives and gain further insights from them. In fact, we found the UK NEA scenarios had already started to develop a ‘life of their own’, in that they were being used outside the UK NEA framework by Forest Research, The Defra Noise Futures Project and the Scottish Government as part of their work. However, whilst we found that they ‘worked’ when people were exposed to them, our findings suggest that more needs to be done to embed the UK NEA scenarios in the thinking of the broader stakeholder community if their full potential is to be realised.
Important barriers to be overcome involve finding ways to communicate the essential features of the scenarios to people so that they can use them actively in debates. This was especially apparent in the work we have done in conjunction with WP8 (see WP8 report) on policy response options. Their experience of using the scenarios to test the robustness of response options under different assumptions about the future will be a significant pointer to how the storylines can be used a decision support role. However, as the work of WP9 has shown (see WP9 Report), while ecosystem knowledge might be available, it may not always be used by policy customers. We have discovered that the time required to work with scenarios might be too long for many of those engaged in policy development in the current environment and so more indirect forms of engaging with this
community may be required. Strategies include working with the kinds of people who advise them, and who act as knowledge brokers in the context of ecosystem services. Engagement might also depend on the preparation of relevant and accessible scenario analyses or products to inform and stimulate debate.
The follow-up work reported here has also sought to explore and expand the model base that can be used in the context of the UK NEA scenarios, and hence enrich them as a ‘scenario product’. The focus has not so much been to use models to test or confirm the projections initially, that is to establish them more firmly as ‘model-based scenarios’, but rather to use them as a framework for additional modelling and analytical studies. Our investigation has demonstrated the value of
reversing the logic that often surrounds models in the context of futures thinking, and has shown the merits of developing ‘scenario-based models’ rather than ‘model-based scenarios’.
Four thematic areas have been targeted to examine how scenario-based models can enrich the debate surrounding ecosystem services under the different UK NEA storylines. We found that the scenarios are, for example, able to provide a framework in which established hydrological and
ecological models can be used to extend the storylines. The results from this study posed some important and novel questions about the trade-offs between the capacity to reduce flooding or prevent drought under the different plausible futures. The richness of the analytical framework that the UK NEA scenarios provide was also demonstrated by the analysis of trade-offs and co-benefits between abundance of farmland birds and other ecosystem services, and between land cover and the supply of cultural ecosystem services around our cities. The study has also shown the potential for deepening the discussion around the scenarios in respect of the marine environment. This work has shown that of four scenarios considered only World Markets appears to result in a marked decline in fish stocks in the period up to 2060. These findings must now be looked at in the context of the marine valuation work that has been undertaken in UK NEAFO (see WP 4 Report).
The analytical and modelling work reported here has also demonstrated the potential for developing new tools to assist people in their thinking about the future. We have for example, developed a Bayesian Belief Network to provide rapid, interactive access to the data produced by the Monitor of Engagement with the Natural Environment (MENE). An internet version of this network is now available and this can be used to explore the conceptual framework for cultural ecosystem services that has been developed in WP5 (see WP5 Report). We have linked this to the geography of the 2011 census, and it now has the potential to model the effects of different assumptions about changes in socio-demographic makeup on the use of cultural spaces and the frequency of different cultural practices.
Thus in answer to the question of how the plausible future scenarios developed in the UK NEA can help us understand, manage and communicate the consequences of changes in ecosystem services across all scales, we suggest that it can be best achieved by recognising that scenarios must facilitate deliberative processes and support the development of analytical products. Both avenues must be pursued if the UK NEA scenarios are to be used effectively in a decision support role. Although we have found it useful to distinguish between these two dimensions, they are in fact mutually supporting and deserve equal attention. The UK NEA scenarios have been found to be sufficiently rich and comprehensive to support debate across a wide range of topics that are relevant to current policy concerns. It is also apparent that the scenarios can aid understanding by providing a
framework in which current models can be applied. Such work has tested the plausibility of the scenarios themselves as well as extended the insights that can be derived from them.
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