Valuing ecosystem services from blue forests: A systematic review of the valuation of salt marshes, sea grass beds and mangrove forests Amber Himes-Cornell a,⇑ , Linwood Pendleton a , Perla Atiyah b a Université de Bretagne Occidentale AMURE/LABEX/IUEM, 12 rue de Kergoat – CS 93837, 29238 Brest Cedex 3, France b Lebanese American University, School of Engineering, Byblos, Lebanon article info Article history: Received 6 September 2017 Received in revised form 23 October 2017 Accepted 10 January 2018 Keywords: Blue carbon Ecosystem services Coastal marine ecosystem Mangrove Sea grass Salt marsh Valuation abstract Coastal ecosystems provide a number of life-sustaining services, from which benefits to humans can be derived. They are often inhabited by aquatic vegetation, such as mangroves, sea grasses and salt marshes. Given their wide geographic distribution and coverage, there is need to prioritize conservation efforts. An understanding of the human importance of these ecosystems can help with that prioritization. Here, we summarize a literature review of ecosystem service valuation studies. We discuss (1) the degree to which current valuation information is sufficient to prioritize blue carbon habitat conservation and restoration, (2) the relevancy of available studies, and (3) what is missing from the literature that would be needed to effectively prioritize conservation. Given the recent focus on blue carbon ecosystems in the international conservation, there are a number of areas where research on blue forest ecosystem assessment and val- uation could be improved, from enhancing available methodologies to increasing valuation of rarely stud- ied ecosystem services and wider geographic coverage of valuation studies. This review highlights these gaps and calls for a focus on broadening the ecosystem services that are valued, the methods used, and increasing valuation in underrepresented regions. Ó 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Contents 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................... 37 2. Background ........................................................................................................... 37 2.1. Blue carbon ecosystems ........................................................................................... 37 2.2. Ecosystem services and valuation ................................................................................... 39 3. Material and methods .................................................................................................. 39 3.1. Literature search ................................................................................................. 39 3.2. Selection criteria ................................................................................................. 40 3.3. Data extraction .................................................................................................. 40 4. Results............................................................................................................... 41 5. Discussion ............................................................................................................ 44 6. Conclusion ........................................................................................................... 46 Acknowledgements .................................................................................................... 47 Appendix A. Supplementary data ........................................................................................ 47 References ........................................................................................................... 47 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoser.2018.01.006 2212-0416/Ó 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. ⇑ Corresponding author at: Fisheries Policy, Economics and Institutions Branch, Fisheries and Aquaculture Policy and Resources Division, Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), Rome, 00153, Italy. Tel.: +39 0657050079. E-mail address: amber.himescornell@fao.org (A. Himes-Cornell). Ecosystem Services 30 (2018) 36–48 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Ecosystem Services journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ecoser