TiRiLab Report No. 4 Ecosystem services assessment in the Maggia River m Gloria Fontana Anna Retsa January 2019 TiRiLab is part of the project HyMoCARES (HydroMorphological assessment and management at basin scale for the Conservation of Alpine Rivers and re- lated Ecosystem Services). Partial funding is provided under the EU Alpine Space Programme through the New Regional Policy of the Swiss Confederation and by the Republic and Canton of Ticino. Disclaimer: This is a student report produced as part of the education pro- gramme in the Master of Environmental Engineering at ETH Zürich. The results reported here are not scientifically reviewed, do not necessarily represent the views of the supervisors, and should be used with caution. For more information contact: Peter Molnar (
[email protected]) Master Project i Abstract The importance of Ecosystem Services assessment is building consent among the private and public sectors related to decision making and is spreading to various management fields. River ecosystem services in particular are being addressed to promote the development of applicable tools in the water man- agement sector. Maggia river ecosystem services assessment is the focus of the present study: the analysis conducted can be defined as a combination of methodologies, tools, and operational guidelines that led to the definition of a framework approach for the assessment of ecosystem services in the domain represented by Maggia valley. The assessment concerns the current state as well as an analysis related to the dependence of the ecosystem services on land use changes and on flow release profiles. A preliminary phase of research was conducted to comprehend the physical and socio-economical features of the territory and to identify the ecosystem serviced to be addressed.