Social benefits of river restoration from ecosystem services perspective: A systematic review

Abstract Major global initiatives such as the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have overlooked the prospects of the river ecosystem in achieving SDGs (e.g., SDGs 6, 14), despite the substantial role of the river in human civilisation, and the contribution of river restoration to ecological improvement. Realising the role of river social-ecological systems in providing ecosystem services (ES) to society, we have made the first step, through a systematic review, to identify progress, gaps and future research directions for river restoration research across the globe. We systematically reviewed articles and summarised the trends of river restoration within the explicit context of ES assessment. The economic and ecological aspects of river restoration were the prime focus of major studies, whereas social benefits have been least addressed. The results identified the research gaps and future opportunities and tried to supplement those gaps by addressing the questions that need to be researched in future studies. The proposed conceptual framework is designed how application of ES perspective help to integrate social benefits in river restoration research. If we are to achieve sustainable management of water, food production and zero hunger goals, overcoming the identified conceptual and methodological gaps and conceptualising the river as a social-ecological system is necessary for future river restoration research.