Water assessment in a peri-urban watershed in Mexico City: A focus on an ecosystem services approach

Abstract Among hydrological ecosystem services, water supply is one of the most relevant to society because of its role in human wellbeing; accordingly, it has been significantly modified worldwide. There has been a recent increase in the necessity of combining methods and tools to create interdisciplinary evaluations of water ecosystem services, especially in developing countries where there is a lack of systematized and updated socioenvironmental information. We propose a framework for the assessment of water supply ecosystem services that includes environmental, social and economic dimensions. We describe and develop each of these dimensions with a particular focus on identifying the key variables that are needed to answer them. First, we performed research of the literature regarding the evaluation methods that are sufficiently flexible to apply them to local scales in countries where information is limited. Then, we chose the Magdalena River Watershed to apply this perspective because it is an illustrative area of vital importance to Mexico City’s ecosystem services. We believe that this proposal has outlined basic guidelines to help decision makers improve water management and may provide an opportunity to change public policies on peri-urban ecosystems.