Role of Ecosystem Services in Enabling Rural-Urban Synergies

This open access book elaborates on the role Ecosystem Services play in relation to establishing, and enhancing, rural-urban synergies. It draws on the concept of Ecosystem Services (ESS) as the ecological characteristics, functions or processes that directly or indirectly contribute to human well-being, that is, the benefits that people derive from functioning ecosystems.

This chapter introduces the rationale and motivation for the book. It highlights the European research project ROBUST (Rural-Urban Outlooks: Unlocking Synergies) within which all the investigation that supports the chapters in this book was conducted. It briefly describes the architecture, the themes and the systemic approach to rural-urban linkages and synergies within the ROBUST project. Finally, the structure of the book is described and a brief summary of each chapter is provided.

Key words: Ecosystem services · Rural-urban linkages · Rural-urban synergies · ROBUST research project