Selection and Application of Ecosystem Evaluation Index for Ranking Inland Wetland Conservation

Abstract

Wetlands are damaged or destroyed by natural processes or artificial interferences. In order to restore their function, it is desirable to establish conservation, restoration and management measures on the basis of comprehensively collected and analyzed data of natural ecosystem characteristics and damage conditions. The purpose is to provide an evaluation index that can reflect the biological and physical characteristics such as the inhabited wildlife, degree of terrestrialization, land use change, etc. Due to the evaluation index should be simplicity of measurement, applicability, and cost efficiency as well as useful for improving the new information is obtained, so we consider the physical and biological characteristics. In order to reflect the ecological integrity and qualitative aspects such as disturbance levels, suitability as biological habitats, etc., biodiversity (landscape units, wildlife inhabit), naturalness (biotope, basin ecosystem), rarity (major plant species emergence, major animal species inhabit), and potential for damage (distribution of pollutant by distance, degree of internal damage) was selected as an evaluation index. The conservation value of Hwapo (23 points) and Samrangjin wetland (21 points), which had low number of species and populations, was low due to high potential for damage like green house, bare land etc. On the other hand, Daepyeong (34 points) and Bacsil wetland (32 points), which have worthy biodiversity, showed high conservation value, while their own area was narrow, but the endangered wildlife (Cygnus cygnus, Anser fabalis, and Euryale ferox) was appeared. Habitat disturbances, such as reduced area or internal damage, can drastic changes at population, ecosystem, and community levels. Hwapo and Samrangjin wetland, which have high damaged potential, are included. The recoverability of wetland ecosystem functions depend on the resistance and regenerative power of the system itself, so maintaining integrity of biodiversity-rich wetlands will have priority over restoration.