Abstract
Abstract Urbanization, which is rapidly increasing in smaller and medium-sized cities, would result in changes in land use/cover (LULC) and urban ecosystem service values. Incorporating ecosystem service values trade-offs and synergies into urban decision-making and planning processes is crucial. However, there is limited evidence about this in rapidly growing cities of the global South, like cities in Ethiopia. In this study, we evaluated the impact of urban LULC dynamics on ecosystem service values (ESV) trade-offs and synergies in the cities of Mekelle, Aksum, and Shire-Indasilassie in Tigray, Ethiopia. We used Landsat satellite images to analyze LULC for the years 1984, 1994, 2003, 2014, and 2020. From 1984 to 2020, farmland has remined the primary land cover in three of the cities, although its area did not consistently increase. Built-up areas experienced the most significant growth of 1,804%, 310%, and 874% in Mekelle, Aksum and Shire-Indasilassie, respectively throughout the entire study period. According to the benefit transfer technique, 15 ESVs were estimated using global and local conservative ESV coefficients. The study shows an ESV reduction of 3.32% in Mekelle and 26.56% in Shire-Indasilassie but an increase of 27.21% in Aksum when using the global ESV coefficients. Using local coefficients, provisioning ESV decreased by 31.2% in Mekelle, 20.2% in Aksum, and 38.7% in Shire-Indasilassie. Over time, the cities have experienced a decrease in food production, biological control, and pollination ESVs. Specifically, the per capita ESVs decreased by 86.63% in Mekelle, 73.71% in Aksum, and 89.77% in Shire-Indasilassie from 1984 to 2020. A significant synergy persisted between provisioning services (food production) and regulating services (biological control and pollination) from 1984 to 2020. While a trade-off occurred between supporting (pollination) and regulating (disturbance regulation, climate regulation, and erosion control). Overall, the trade-off relationship was dominant in Mekelle, while the synergistic relationship was dominant in Aksum and Shire-Indasilassie. Urban expansion and LULC dynamics caused changes in trade-offs and synergistic interactions of the ESVs. The differences in trade-offs and synergies of ecosystem services in these three cities were significant and required location-specific urban green infrastructure planning. Integrating analysis of LULC dynamics, changes in ESVs, and long-term monitoring of ES value trade-offs and synergies in urban decision-making and planning processes is important to increase the ESV in rapidly growing cities.