Editorial: Mountain landscapes: Protected areas, ecosystem services, and future challenges

Mountain regions provide crucial ecosystem services (ES) to their inhabitants and to the surrounding lowland populations. However, multiple anthropogenic drivers, such as land-use change, climate change, overexploitation, and population growth severely affect mountain socio-ecological systems, with huge effects on ES provision. This Special Issue (SI) collects 29 contributions addressing (i) current research gaps in our understanding of landscape dynamics and their effects on ES, (ii) ES in protected areas, and (iii) new approaches to a holistic assessment of socio-ecological systems. This introduction to the SI summarizes major findings related to (i) the impacts of global change on ES, (ii) the role of protected areas, and (iii) the challenges and research requirements to develop sustainable management strategies for mountain landscapes in the light of current and future challenges. The findings emphasize the specific environmental and cultural characteristics of mountain regions as well as their importance to a large part of the global population. Due to regional differences in socio-ecological characteristics, the needs and values of local communities need to be better integrated into decision-making, supported by inter- and trans-disciplinary cooperation, which would also lead to improved ES provision at the global level.