Assessing the robustness and resilience of subsistence ecosystem services using a socioecological network

Abstract We have limited understanding about the collapse and vulnerability of ecosystem services to failures. To address this, we simulated species loss scenarios in a socioecological network to identify the point at which ecosystem services are lost and use this information to quantify their robustness. By including interaction rewiring within our simulations, we also infer the resilience of ecosystem services and identify key species that support this. Our results show that incorporating local and indigenous knowledge about plant uses into our simulations impacts the reorganisation of ecological and socioecological interactions after species losses, increasing the resilience of ecosystem services. Furthermore, we identified shifts in the roles that species play in direct provisioning, and maintaining robust and resilient ecosystem services, achieving a better understanding of how species directly and indirectly support services. Overall, this study offers a novel approach to predicting the impacts of biodiversity loss on ecosystem services and human livelihoods. Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest.