The wetlands have value as functional processes inside an ecological chain, but the services provided to the society by the wetlands are considered intangibles, and in many cases as services that should come free, like clean air and clean water. A quantification of their values is no so easily determined. As a species support, wetlands provide important and valuable harvests and recreational fishing and hunting. As ecosystem, wetlands moderate the effects of floods, improve the water quality and have aesthetic and heritage value, besides contributing to the stability of global levels of available nitrogen, atmospheric sulfur, carbon dioxide and methane. There is not a common factor to convert all these benefits to human economic systems, so the valuation for purposes of wetland management is difficult and turn to a complicated conflict between private owners' interest in the wetlands and the value that represent to the public at large.
Wetlands influence regional water flow regimes.
One way they do this is to intercept storm runoff and store storm waters, and hence change sharp runoff peaks to slower discharges over long periods of time. The study found that the increase in peak stream flow was significant when wetlands were removed. Storm Abatement Coastal wetlands absorb ocean storms as they come ashore. Here salt marshes and mangrove wetlands act as giant storm buffers. However, definitely some recharge occurs from standing water.