Soil and water: Bases for the sustainability of ecosystem services

Postgraduate Degree

Ano Letivo 2026/2027

Soil and water are vital natural resources for multiple ecosystem services - the benefits that societies derive from the environment and nature. It is common to divide these services into provisioning services (production of food, fiber, bioenergy, water, etc.), regulating and supporting services (carbon cycling and climate change mitigation, water and nutrient cycling, biodiversity conservation, etc.) and cultural services (preservation of natural and cultural heritage, tourism, etc.). The growing demand for some of these services, especially those that involve the production of easily monetizable goods (e.g. biomass), tends to lead to pressures that can lead to overexploitation for one service to the detriment of others, which can generate disservices or losses for societies (e.g. soil degradation and water waste). Sustainable development requires management approaches capable of integrating all the services provided by ecosystems subject to different degrees of human intervention: from nature reserves to urban areas, including forestry production systems, agro-sylvo-pastoral systems and agrosystems of greater or lesser intensification. This course proposes a project-based learning approach, applied to the study of relevant cases, aiming to enable students to analyze and evaluate integrated soil and water management practices, in different types of land use and production systems, as well as to develop sustainable management proposals for these resources and the production systems they support.