Practices and opportunities of ecosystem service studies for ecological restoration in China

New approaches have emerged in integrating ecosystem services, their structure and function for ecological restoration. As the concept relating with ecosystem services has become widely accepted in last decade in China, its linking with ecological restoration will provide good opportunities and make substantial progress towards sustainable development. By analyzing the traditional ecological restoration procedure in China, we developed a framework of ecological restoration based on ecosystem services valuation. Relevant researches of ecological restoration based on ecosystem services are also carefully reviewed. China’s ecosystem services studies and payments for ecosystem services (PES) experiences were extensively discussed to show the ecological restoration strategy and its change. Two case studies in China were presented to show the framework for ecological restoration based on PES. We suggested that despite the limitations of valuation uncertainties at present, PES could be an opportunity for ecological restoration by evaluating the trade-offs of different stakeholders. In current state in China, challenges and opportunities coexist and scientists should work together in the integrated research of sustainable ecological management and economic development policies.