Abstract

The degradation of biodiversity and ecosystem services on farmland stresses the urgency of farming more biodiversity-friendly. Despite increasing evidence that biodiversity-based ecosystem services can support agricultural production, farmers are reluctant to manage for biodiversity. This may have economic reasons as the costs of enhancing biodiversity may outweigh the benefits provided by specific ecosystem services. However, this has not been evaluated across multiple ecosystem services simultaneously. Focusing on grasslands, we found that only increasing legume cover supported agricultural production and could partially replace fertilizer inputs, while contributions of all other biodiversity-based ecosystem services were relatively minor. Ecosystem service delivery mostly traded off against farmer income whereas increasing management intensity maximized productivity and farmer income. These results imply that in agricultural grasslands most biodiversity-based ecosystem services should be considered public goods, and that the restoration of these services requires societal support that makes biodiversity management economically rewarding.