The inference is that once performance standards are attained, there is a reasonably good chance that other ecosystem functions have also been resuscitated. Performance standards should be considered as indications of the degree to which restoration has been achieved. They do not substitute for the comprehensive documentation of a restoration program. As such, the utility of performance standards is most beneficial in the earlier stages of a restoration program, in order to provide those rapid assessments that may be needed to plan subsequent restoration activities. For that reason, the Society for Ecological Restoration recommends the use of performance standards in the initial stages of a restoration program.
Agreement is needed for a standard approach for making comprehensive evaluations.
Each evaluation must be tailored substantially to site-specific conditions. Nonetheless, all evaluations should share a common standard that allows some degree of comparability. The Society recommends that this standard should be the determination of the degree to which the restoration reestablishes the biodiversity, ecosystem functions, disturbance regime, and abiotic services of the reference ecosystem. All four of these qualities may be affected when an ecosystem is converted from its undisturbed condition. Restoration should arrest the conversion process and reestablish biodiversity and abiotic parameters to the point that normal ecosystem functions are realised.