Social and ecological effectiveness of large marine protected areas
Ban, NC; Davies, TE; Aguilera, SE; et al.Brooks, C; Cox, M; Epstein, G; Evans, L; Maxwell, SM; Nenadovich, M
Date: 12 February 2017
Article
Journal
Global Environmental Change
Publisher
Elsevier
Publisher DOI
Abstract
Large marine protected areas are increasingly being established to meet global conservation
targets and promote sustainable use of resources. Although the factors affecting the performance
of small-scale marine protected areas are relatively well studied, there is no such body of
knowledge for large marine protected areas. We conducted ...
Large marine protected areas are increasingly being established to meet global conservation
targets and promote sustainable use of resources. Although the factors affecting the performance
of small-scale marine protected areas are relatively well studied, there is no such body of
knowledge for large marine protected areas. We conducted a global meta-analysis to
systematically investigate social, ecological, and governance characteristics of successful large
marine protected areas with respect to several social and ecological outcomes. We included all
large (>10,000km2), implemented (>5 years of active management) marine protected areas that
had sufficient data for analysis, for a total of twelve cases. We used the Social-Ecological
Systems Meta-Analysis Database, and a consistent protocol for using secondary data and key
informant interviews, to code proxies for fisheries, ecosystem health, and the wellbeing of user
groups (mainly fishers). We tested four sets of hypotheses derived from the literature on smallscale
marine protected areas and common-pool resources: (i) the attributes of species and
ecosystems to be managed in the marine protected area, (ii) adherence to principles for designing
small-scale marine protected areas, (iii) adherence to the design principles for common-pool
resource management, and (iv) stakeholder participation. We found varying levels of support for
these hypotheses. Improved fisheries were associated with older marine protected areas, and
higher levels of enforcement. Declining fisheries were associated with several ecological and
economic factors, including low productivity, high mobility, and high market value. High levels
of participation were correlated with improvements in wellbeing and ecosystem health trends.
Overall, this study constitutes an important first step in identifying factors affecting social
wellbeing and ecological performance of large marine protected areas.
Geography - old structure
Collections of Former Colleges
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