protecting marine spaces global targets and changing approaches

8/13/2019 Protecting Marine Spaces Global Targets and Changing Approaches

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LEIDEN BOSTON

OCEANYEARBOOK

Edited byAldo Chircop, Scott Cofen-Smout, and Moira McConnell

Sponsored by theInternationalOcean Institute

Sponsored by the Marine &Environmental Law Institute

of the Schulich School of Law


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v

Contents

Peter Serracino Inglott (): In Memoriam ixJon Markham Van Dyke (): In Memoriam xv

The International Ocean Institute xixMarine & Environmental Law Institute, Schulich School of Law xxvAcknowledgements xxvii

Issues and Prospects

Carbon Dioxide Storage in the Sub-seabed and Sustainable Development:Please Mind the Gap, Chiara Armeni

Addressing Ocean Acidication as Part of Sustainable Ocean Development,Sarah R. Cooley and Jeremy T. Mathis 29

UNCLOS at Thirty: Open Challenges, Tullio Treves 49

Rio+

Rio+20 and the Oceans: Past, Present, and Future,Susan Lieberman and Joan Yang 67

Indigenous Knowledge in Marine and Coastal Policy and Management,Monica E. Mulrennan 89

Rio+20: Indigenous Knowledge and Intellectual Property in Coastal andOcean Law, Chidi Oguamanam

Coastal and Marine Spatial Planning

Improving Sea-Land Management by Linking Maritime Spatial Planning andIntegrated Coastal Zone Management: French and Belgian Experiences,

Betty Quefelec and Frank Maes 147International Progress in Marine Spatial Planning,

Stephen Jay, Wesley Flannery, Joanna Vince, Wen-Hong Liu,

Julia Guifang Xue, Magdalena Matczak, Jacek Zaucha, Holger Janssen,Jan van Tatenhove, Hilde Toonen, Andrea Morf, Erik Olsen,Juan Luis Surez de Vivero, Juan Carlos Rodrguez Mateos,Helena Calado, John Duf and Hanna Dean 171


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vi Contents

Protecting Marine Spaces: Global Targets and Changing Approaches,Mark D. Spalding, Imn Meliane, Amy Milam, Claire Fitzgerald and

Lynne Z. Hale

Living Resources and Aquaculture

Fisheries Management and Governance: Forces of Change and Inertia,Anthony Charles 249

Fishing for Self-determination: European Fisheries and Western Sahara The Case of Ocean Resources in Africas Last Colony,

Jefrey Smith 267Sustainability in Aquaculture: Present Problems and Sustainable Solutions,

Michelle Allsopp, David Santillo and Cat Dorey 291

Maritime Transport and Security

Migrant Smuggling by Sea: Tackling Practical Problems by Applying a

High-level Inter-agency Approach,Jasmine Coppens Recent Developments and Continuing Challenges in the Regulation ofGreenhouse Gas Emissions from International Shipping,

James Harrison 359Implementation of the 2004 Ballast Water Management Convention in the

West African Region: Challenges and Prospects,Sabitiyu Abosede Lawal 385

Law of the Sea and Maritime Boundaries

Recalling the Falkland Islands (Malvinas) Sovereignty Formula,Vasco Becker-Weinberg 411

Navigating between Consolidation and Innovation:Bangladesh/Myanmar(International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, Judgment of14 March 2012),Erik Franckx and Marco Benatar 435

Polar Oceans Governance

The European Union and the North: Towards the Development of an EU ArcticPolicy?,Mar Campins Eritja 459

Arctic Council Observer: The Development and Signicance of PolandsApproach towards the Arctic Region,Micha uszczuk 487


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viii Contents

2. United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea Reportof the Twenty-Second Meeting of States Parties, 411 June 2012 621

3. Report on the Work of the United Nations Open-ended InformalConsultative Process on Oceans and the Law of the Sea at Its ThirteenthMeeting, 29 May1 June 2012 643

4. The Future We Want, Draft Resolution Submitted by the President ofthe General Assembly 659

5. The Oceans Compact: Healthy Oceans for Prosperity 717 6. Commonwealth Maritime Boundaries and Ocean Governance

Forum: Beneting from the Ocean Economy, Proceedings of the FirstCommonwealth Maritime Boundaries and Ocean Governance Forum,

1719 April 2012 725

Contributors 757

Index 771


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Ocean Yearbook: Mark D. Spalding, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of theCreative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial . Unported (CC BY-NC .) License.

* The authors would like to thank Lisa Duarte of the USGS Gap Analysis Program andMimi DIorio of the NOAA National MPA Center. Also we thank Simon Blyth of UNEP-WCMC

who assisted in the preparation of the MPA layer, and the other staf in the UNEP-WCMCsMarine Assessment and Decision Support Programme. UNEP-WCMCs contribution to thisarticle was partially supported by the Marine Conservation Biology Institute.

. B.S. Halpern et al., A global map of human impact on marine ecosystems, Science (): ; C.D.G. Harley et al., The impacts of climate change in coastal marinesystems,Ecology Letters (): .


Protecting Marine Spaces: Global Targets and ChangingApproaches

Mark D. Spalding*

Global Marine Team, The Nature Conservancy, and Department of Zoology,

University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom

Imn MelianeGlobal Marine Team, The Nature Conservancy, Arlington, Virginia, USA

Amy Milam

Protected Areas Programme, United Nations Environment Programme World

Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC), Cambridge, United Kingdom

Claire Fitzgerald

Marine Assessment and Decision Support Programme, UNEP-WCMC,Cambridge, United Kingdom; DMC International Imaging Ltd., Guildford,

Surrey, United Kingdom

Lynne Z. Hale

Global Marine Team, The Nature Conservancy, University of Rhode Island,

Narragansett Bay Campus, Narragansett, Rhode Island, USA

INTRODUCTION

Threats to the marine environment are complex, multiple, and often overlapping orsynergistic. Mitigating these threats, likewise, is not simple, but rather relies on


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. J. Rof and M. Zacharias, Approaches to Marine Conservation, inMarineConservation Ecology(London: Earthscan Ltd., ), pp. .

. Convention on Biological Diversity, entered into force December .

United Nations Treaty Series; International Legal Materials (), available online: .

. S.H.M. Butchart et al., Global Biodiversity: Indicators of Recent Declines, Science, no. (): .

. CBD COP Tenth Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention onBiological Diversity. Nagoya, Japan October . Decision X/. Strategic Plan forBiodiversity , (United Nations Environment Programme, ).

multiple management approaches, ranging from controls on shing, sand and gravelextraction, energy development, shipping, and waste water disposal, to active inter-

ventions such as restoration and re-stocking, through to managing ex situthreats bymanaging human activities in adjacent watersheds. Among this array of approaches,one of the key tools for conservation has been marine protected areas (MPAs).

Initially, calls for MPAs were highly targeted, with conservation-based non-governmental organizations (NGOs) driving attention towards conserving criticalhabitats for endangered and charismatic species such as turtles and marine mam-mals, and to high-prole habitats such as coral reefs, intertidal wetlands and rockyshores. In most cases, the primary focus was on preserving the healthiest and mostdiverse ecosystems.

World-wide eforts at marine conservation were given a clearer frameworkwithin the formulation of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). ThisConvention called for a broad ecosystem approach to conservation, and while pro-tected areas were described as one important means to achieve conservation gains,they were not intended to be the sole mechanism. Subsequent eforts used protectedareas as both a target and a metric for assessing conservation progress. Given thelack of any other reliable global metrics, this may have led to an over-reliance onMPA assessments as an indicator of progress in marine conservation.

The most recent review and renewal of global biodiversity conservation com-

mitments came in Nagoya with the formulation of the Aichi Targets. As with earliertargets these once again stress the need for a broad array of conservation eforts,taking an ecosystem-based approach. Protected areas are again mentioned as apartof the solution. The Aichi Targets also greatly strengthen the emphasis on thebroader benets of biodiversity to people. While biodiversityper seremains impor-tant, the Aichi Targets expressly added the need to reconcile conservation anddevelopment, and conserve ecosystem service benets for human well-being.

This article provides a broad overview of the development of internationalcommitments with regard to marine biodiversity conservation, giving a particular

focus on MPA-related targets. The work falls into four main sections beginning witha summary of the international policy and legal frameworks that have encouragedthe protection and management of living marine resources. Section II provides areview of global MPAs, considering political and biogeographic patterns in coverage.Section III takes a detailed look at the Aichi Targets for protected areas coverage, and
http://www.cbd.int/convention/text/http://www.cbd.int/convention/text/


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Protecting Marine Spaces

. P. Sands, J. Peel, A. Fabra and R. MacKenzie,Principles of International EnvironmentalLaw(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, ).

. UNCLOS, United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of December ,(United Nations Environment Programme, ).

. UNCLOS, Preamble, n. above.

considers how current coverage contributes to that target. Finally, Section IV drawstogether these observations to consider future trends and needs for marine protec-

tion and the achievement of international targets.MPA coverage has shown dramatic increases in recent years. While this gives

the impression that area-based conservation targets might be attainable, we pointout that protected area targets extend well beyond simple metrics of cover, callingfor efectiveness, for representative coverage, for ecosystem services benets, andfor the consideration of protected areas within wider ecosystem settings. We suggestthat recent trends in MPA coverage may not be contributing as greatly to progress asthe headline numbers suggest. We highlight the urgent need for a wider debate ondenitions and metrics in order not only to measure progress but to support coun-

tries in their approaches to improving conservation and management of oceanspace and resources. In particular, we recommend that greater attention be given tothe role of economic and social factors in MPA selection and designation in order tosecure greater benets to people; that MPAs be embedded in a wider context ofcomprehensive marine and coastal management; and that they be placed wherethey can truly address the primary threats and gaps, not simply where they can beestablished with minimal conict.

I. POLICY AND MANAGEMENT SETTINGS

Early eforts towards protection and management of oceans and marine resourcesby the international community began through a series of somewhat unconnectedmeasures and legal instruments focusing on the prevention of marine pollution andon the sustainable management of specic living marine resources. These were fol-lowed by agreements more specically targeting the conservation of species andhabitats. More recently, there has been a clear move towards a more integratedapproach, in which the conservation of marine biodiversity as a regulatory goal is

rmly embedded with other management measures.The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), considered

by many as the constitution for the oceans, establishes the foundation of the man-agement regime in the oceans. UNCLOS was built on the principle that the prob-lems of ocean space are closely interrelated and need to be considered as a whole.It provides a comprehensive framework for regulating the use and development ofocean space, and species the rights and responsibilities of nations as well as thegeneral objectives and principles that are to guide ocean use, both within and


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. L. Kimball,International Ocean Governance. Using international law and organisa-tion to manage marine resources sustainably(Gland, Switzerland and Cambrige, UK: IUCN World Conservation Union, ).

. CBD, Convention on Biological Diversity, (United Nations Environment Pro-gramme, ).

. UNCED,Earth SummitAgenda . The United Nations Programme of Action from Rio(UN Department for Economic and Social Afairs, ).

beyond states national jurisdiction. UNCLOS often has very broad and general pro-visions and does not address all marine-related issues, particularly in relation to the

conservation of marine biodiversity and ecosystems. The general provisions that itincludes on protection of the marine environment are primarily in Article whichestablishes that States have the obligation to protect and preserve the marine envi-ronment, and Article (), which primarily outlines states obligations to prevent,reduce, and control pollution, and adds that the measures taken in accordance withthis Part shall include those necessary to protect and preserve rare or fragile ecosys-tems as well as the habitat of depleted, threatened or endangered species and otherforms of marine life.

UNCLOS was designed to serve as a unifying framework for a growing number

of more detailed international agreements on marine environmental protection andthe conservation and management of marine resources. It has proven to be su-ciently exible to allow the incorporation of modern principles of ocean govern-ance in the many treaties and regional measures adopted since .

The Earth Summit in Rio instituted one of the most important principlesin modern conservation, namely the ecosystem approach, through the adoption ofthe CBD that played a key role in fostering the notion of ecosystem-based manage-ment, with ecosystems as the primary framework for implementation. It activelypromoted the importance of protected areas as a tool to implement ecosystem-

based management. The Earth Summit also adopted Agenda , a non-binding, butcomprehensive blueprint for action to be taken globally, nationally, and by local gov-ernments and other stakeholders to achieve environmental sustainability. Its dedi-cated chapter on oceans acknowledged that it was necessary to take new approachesto marine and coastal area management and development that are integrated incontent and are precautionary and anticipatory in ambit. Agenda called on statesto undertake measures to maintain biological diversity and productivity of marinespecies and habitats under national jurisdiction and to identify marine ecosystemsexhibiting high levels of biodiversity and productivity and other critical habitat

areas and provide necessary limitations on use in these areas, through, inter alia,designation of protected areas. This efectively introduced the ecosystem approachto conservation planning.

Ten years later, the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation of the World Summiton Sustainable Development (WSSD) encouraged the application, by , of theecosystem approach and promoted integrated, multidisciplinary and multisectoralcoastal and ocean development. WSSD set one of the rst targets for MPAs, calling


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. WSSD, Plan of Implementation of the World Summit on Sustainable Development,

(United Nations, ).. See UNEP website: .. FAO, Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries (Rome: Food and Agriculture

Organization of the United Nations, ).. FAO, Report of the twenty-sixth session of the Committee on Fisheries. Rome,

March , Committee on Fisheries (COFI), Food and Agriculture Organization ofthe United Nations, FAO Fisheries Report No. (Rome, ).

for the establishment by of MPA networks as one of the diverse approaches toimprove the management of oceans.

After the Earth Summit, and more intensively after the WSSD, other interna-tional arrangements began to introduce progressively an ecosystem approach totheir regimes, with growing calls to conserve marine and coastal biodiversity, and inparticular to establish MPAs. Several regional initiatives have followed the globalprocesses towards greater integration of regulations. The regional seas conventionsthat were originally heavily focused on pollution have either been amended or haveadopted additional instruments to incorporate new principles of ecosystem-basedmanagement and the conservation of marine biodiversity. For example, the Convention for the Protection and Development of the Marine Environment of the

Wider Caribbean Region (Cartagena Convention) adopted the Specially ProtectedAreas and Wildlife (SPAW) protocol in ; and the Convention for theProtection of the Mediterranean Sea Against Pollution (Barcelona Convention) wasamended in to broaden its original scope on pollution to integrate protectionof the marine environment and the natural resources.

In addition to the conservation oriented agreements, the notion of ecosystemmanagement has also been taken up by a number of marine sectoral activities, inparticular sheries. FAO adopted the Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheriesin that set forward the ecosystem approach to sheries and recognized oppor-

tunities to integrate MPAs as a sheries management tool. FAO later developedtechnical guidelines on the design, implementation and testing of MPAs in sheriesmanagement to assist its member states to achieve the World Summit on SustainableDevelopment (WSSD) goal with respect to representative networks of MPAs by. As a result, many regional sheries management organizations are increas-ingly considering establishing MPAs within their areas of application. Until ,the majority of international commitments for ocean conservation focused onachieving an integrated approach to ocean management and highlighted MPAs pri-marily as one measure among others that could help in the implementation of such

an approach.

Numerical Targets for MPA Coverage

In , the Convention on Biological Diversity further reinforced the MPAtarget set by WSSD, by adopting a number of biome-specic sub-targets. Specically,
http://www.unep.org/regionalseas/http://www.unep.org/regionalseas/


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. CBD, COP Eighth Ordinary Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to theConvention on Biological Diversity. Curitiba, March . Decision VIII/: Framework

for monitoring implementation of the achievement of the target and integration oftargets into the thematic programmes of work. Annex , (United Nations EnvironmentProgramme, ).

. C. Toropova, I. Meliane, D. Lafoley, E. Matthews and M. Spalding, eds., Global OceanProtection: Present Status and Future Possibilities (Gland, Switzerland: IUCN, The Nature

Conservancy, UNEP-WCMC, UNEP, UNU-IAS, Agence des aires marines protges, France,).

. Butchart et al., n. above.

these focused on the agreement that at least % of each of the worlds ecologicalregions [should be] efectively conserved (target .), and that areas of particular

importance to biodiversity [should be] protected (target .). For the past fewyears, these targets have dominated the marine conservation agenda of countries,NGOs and donor agencies. They have spurred numerous dedicated initiatives andattracted resources to support their achievement. The focus for these eforts was onprotecting areas of importance for biodiversity, with their objectives generallyfocusing on conservation and management of habitats, species, or genetic diversity.

In , Toropova et al. provided an assessment of where the global communitystood with regard to the MPA target, showing that while the total ocean area pro-tected had risen by over percent since , the world was still far from achiev-

ing the percent target, with only . percent of the oceans surface area designatedwithin MPAs, and with uneven and patchy ecological representation. The globalcommunity was likely to fail to meet this target, as well as many others.

The CBD meeting in Nagoya in had a strong focus on assessing progress,and led to the negotiation of a series of new targets for biodiversity conservation:the Aichi Targets. Not surprisingly these were heavily inuenced by the perceivedfeasibility of the task as countries struggled to reach a compromise between ambi-tious and realistic targets. The MPA target was one of the most controversial to nego-tiate. There were lengthy debates as some countries argued for adopting a smaller

percentage of the ocean surface to be protected, while others fought to keep the percent target. The resulting compromise consisted of keeping the percent gurewith the addition of few but signicant changes in the targets scope. Aichi Target states that by percent of coastal and marine areas, especially areas ofparticular importance for biodiversity and ecosystem services, are conservedthrough efectively and equitably managed, ecologically representative and well-connected systems of protected areas and other efective area-based conservationmeasures, and integrated into the wider landscapes and seascapes.

The revised language on spatial protection measures presented in Aichi Target

includes four novel concepts that are important to highlight:

The Addition of the Areas of Particular Importance for Ecosystem Services

A vision of living in harmony with nature overarches all the Aichi targets, and atvarious points the targets require a shift in the objectives and design of conservation


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. A. Balmford et al., Economic reasons for conserving wild nature, Science ,no. (): ; N. Dudley et al.,Natural Solutions: Protected areas helping peoplecope with climate change (Gland, Switzerland: IUCN WCPA, TNC, UNDP, WCS, The WorldBank and WWF, ); C. Leisher, P. van Beukering and L.M. Scherl,Natures Investment

Bank: How marine protected areas contribute to poverty reduction(Arlington, VA: The NatureConservancy, ); C.M. Roberts, J.P. Hawkins and F.R. Gell, The role of marine reserves inachieving sustainable sheries,Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, B, no. ().

. H. Leslie, A synthesis of marine conservation planning approaches, ConservationBiology, no. (): ; K.A. Wilson et al., Conserving biodiversity eciently:

What to do, where, and when,PLoS Biology, no. (): e.. M.B. Mascia, C.A. Claus and R. Naidoo, Impacts of marine protected areas on

shing communities, Conservation Biology , no. (): ; J.N. Sanchirico,K.A. Cochran and P.M. Emerson,Marine Protected Areas: Economic and Social Implications,(Washington D.C.: Resources for the Future, ).

. D. Brockington and J. Igoe, Eviction for conservation: A global overview,Conservation and Society, no. (): .

measures to deliver benets for people. This is specically called for in Aichi Target, by adding ecosystem services alongside biodiversity as a central criterion for

selecting conservation areas.Such a shift is not controversial, in that many studies have highlighted the

importance of MPAs for human well-being, and such benets are often listed asjustication for establishing MPAs. Even so, it represents a signicant shift from the protected areas targets, which remained focused on biodiversity benets. Itmay also challenge some of the existing prioritization and site selection approachesthat have tended to focus solely on maximizing biodiversity benets.

By calling for a specic inclusion of ecosystem services in spatial conservationgoals, Aichi Target makes explicit an acknowledged and important connection.

Application of this concept, however, could bring some important changes to con-servation planning.

The Notion of Equity

The explicit use of the term equitably managed in Aichi Target reects both theimportance of addressing equity and governance issues as fundamental to the suc-cess of MPAs, and the need to undertake further eforts in this regard. Equity issuesregularly arise because MPAs will most likely afect user groups disproportionately.

There has also been a long history of conservation measures that were seen as top-down and harmful to local communities and users of natural resources. This isnow widely acknowledged and there has been a burgeoning of eforts to engagelocal and indigenous peoples in protected areas establishment and management.Principles of equity, power sharing, participation, and sharing of benets areincreasingly a norm in MPAs at local and national levels, and these same principlesare being incorporated into government, NGO, and donor policies, and are being


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. A. Kothari, Protected areas and people: the future of the past,Protected AreasProgramme, no. (): .

. P.J.S. Jones, Marine reserve strategies: Issues, divergences and the search for mid-dle ground,Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries (): ; E. De Santo, P. Jones andA. Miller, Fortress conservation at sea: A commentary on the Chagos marine protected area,

Marine Policy, no. (): .. F. Douvere and C. Ehler, Ecosystem-based marine spatial management: An evolv-

ing paradigm for the management of coastal and marine places, Ocean Yearbook ():; M.M. Foley et al., Guiding ecological principles for marine spatial planning,Marine

Policy, no. (); S. Katsanevakis et al., Ecosystem-based marine spatial management:Review of concepts, policies, tools, and critical issues, Ocean & Coastal Management ,no. (): .

used as tools by communities to demand changes in policy and practice. In somesenses, then, the recognition of the need for equity in MPA management is simply

an acknowledgement of an ongoing process, but there are still cases where userneeds and local participation are not included.

The Notion of Other Efective Area-based Conservation Measures

While earlier targets had a clear focus on MPAs, Aichi Target explicitly recognizesthat other spatial conservation measures, not recognized or recorded as MPAs, mayalso achieve important conservation gains. This wording may help to ensure thatexisting protected areas that have not been incorporated into formal datasets arenot ignored, but it also allows for the inclusion of other spatial management inter-ventions that may not meet the denition of a protected area. Part of the motivationfor this change in the wording came from a concern by some Parties that protectionis widespread even beyond clearly dened protected areas, and that a focus solelyon the latter would make it hard, if not impossible, to achieve the target within thetimeframe. Parties also argued that this clause was particularly important to ensurethe inclusion of areas protected under sheries regulations.

In sum, the clause clearly requires that the measures be efective, area-based,and with a conservation focus, but there remains an urgent need to further explore

the extent and limits of what these measures might include. In Section IV we con-sider some of these ideas further.

The Notion of Integration into the Wider Landscapes and Seascapes

As highlighted above, all international commitments up to WSSD have promotedMPAs aspartof the solution to marine conservation. MPAs cannot be efective inisolation, but need to be nested in a broader framework of integrated management,and complemented by other measures to reduce threats and impacts. The future ofmarine biodiversity, of associated ecosystem service benets, and indeed ofMPAs themselves, is heavily dependent on the management of their surroundingenvironments.


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Aichi Target gives a valuable, formal expression to this fact and should beused to encourage the tracking not only of MPA coverage, but also of management

of the wider environment in order to measure success. This provision provides aclear link between Target and many of the other Aichi targets, including severalthat are particularly relevant to the marine environment (see Table ). These targetshave received less attention, but if properly applied would have a profound and pos-itive inuence on the use and condition of ocean space. They are central to design-ing and implementing an ecosystem-based approach for ocean and coastalmanagement.

Target By , the rate of loss of all natural habitats, including forests, is at least halved and wherefeasible brought close to zero, and degradation and fragmentation is signicantly reduced.

Target By , all sh and invertebrate stocks and aquatic plants are managed and harvested sustainably,legally and applying ecosystem-based approaches, so that overshing is avoided, recovery plansand measures are in place for all depleted species, sheries have no signicant adverse impacts onthreatened species and vulnerable ecosystems and the impacts of sheries on stocks, species and

ecosystems are within safe ecological limits.Target By , pollution, including from excess nutrients, has been brought to levels that are notdetrimental to ecosystem function and biodiversity.

Target By , invasive alien species and pathways are identied and prioritized, priority speciesare controlled or eradicated, and measures are in place to manage pathways to prevent theirintroduction and establishment.

Target By , the multiple anthropogenic pressures on coral reefs, and other vulnerable ecosystemsimpacted by climate change or ocean acidication are minimized, so as to maintain their integrity

and functioning.Target By , at least percent of terrestrial and inland water areas, and percent of coastaland marine areas, especially areas of particular importance for biodiversity and ecosystemservices, are conserved through efectively and equitably managed, ecologicallyrepresentative and well connected systems of protected areas and other efectivearea-based conservation measures, and integrated into the wider landscapesand seascapes.

Target By , ecosystems that provide essential services, including services related to water, andcontribute to health, livelihoods and well-being, are restored and safeguarded, taking into accountthe needs of women, indigenous and local communities, and the poor and vulnerable.

Target By , ecosystem resilience and the contribution of biodiversity to carbon stocks has beenenhanced, through conservation and restoration, including restoration of at least percent ofdegraded ecosystems, thereby contributing to climate change mitigation and adaptation and tocombating desertication.

Source: CBD, n. above.

Table .Nagoya Aichi Targets of particular relevance to marine and coastal settings


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. SeeMPA News: .. M.C. Ribeiro, The Rainbow: The rst national marine protected area proposed

under the high seas, The International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law, no. ():.

combining total marine and proportion of marine coverage. This was fol-lowed by apost-hocreview that enabled some removal or inclusion of sites

based on category (all sites with marine or similar words in their designa-tion were included) or on geospatial indicators of marine presence (obvi-ously misplaced sites such as those tracing a coastline or island boundarybut ofset).

) Improvement of particular site information from other regional or nationaldatasets where these were not included in the latest version of the WDPA(e.g., US MPAs for US Caribbean and Pacic territories; Caribbean IslandsMPAs from The Nature Conservancys (TNCs) regional database; and asmall number of Indonesian islands from TNC),

) New large sites. While MPAs are being continually designated and it isimpossible to remain fully up-to-date, an internet-based search, includingchecking of all recent editions ofMPA News, was undertaken to ensurethat large designations, at the scale likely to inuence national and regionalstatistics, were included.

Previous studies of this sort excluded international designations. The reasons forthis were twofold. First, almost all sites designated under the global conventions(e.g., Ramsar, World Heritage) are also protected under national regulations and so

would still be counted. Secondly, the level of protection or additional protectionprovided by such designations was once somewhat limited, but this may be chang-ing. The latest version of the WDPA includes a very large number of internationalsites covered by regional conventions (EU, OSPAR, CCAMLR), while we are awareof a small but not trivial number of sites covered by global conventions such asRamsar that do not have matching national designation, but that do indeed pro-vide some level of legal protection. There are also a number of newly designatedsites in areas beyond national jurisdiction, which can only be governed throughcompetent regional agreements, and one site (Rainbow Hydrothermal Vent Field,

Azores) that has been designated in an extended jurisdiction claim for nationallevel management.

Data Preparation

Following the compilation of data from WDPA and other sources, duplicated siteswere removed leaving a total of some , sites. These included , sites forwhich boundary information was unavailable, but centroid geographic co-ordinatesare known. For these, a bufer was created around these centroids equal to the

reported site area. For just sites, the size of the site area was also unknown.
http://depts.washington.edu/mpanews/http://depts.washington.edu/mpanews/


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. M. Spalding, L. Wood, C. Fitzgerald and K. Gjerde, The % target: Where do westand?, in Toropova et al., n. above, pp. . Note that in using this article, correctedstatistics were released, which are used in this document and are available online:

.

. M.D. Spalding et al., Marine ecoregions of the world: A bioregionalization of coastand shelf areas,BioScience, no. (): .

. M. Spalding, V. Agostini, S. Grant and J. Rice, Pelagic provinces of the world:A biogeographic classication of the worlds surface pelagic waters, Ocean and Coastal

Management (): .

In most cases such sites are small and so we bufered these to create circular poly-gons of km following the protocol established in an earlier study.

Many protected areas in the database are overlapping most of this is real andrelated to the existence of multiple designations for the same location, such asstricter levels of protection within larger sites, or international designations overlap-ping national sites. Thus, while all sites were used for the calculation of MPA num-bers per country, for the spatial analysis it was important to avoid double countingand so all overlapping polygons were dissolved to create a single layer for the inter-section analysis.

Spatial Analysis

With this nal global layer, statistics were generated using ArcMap, calculating thespatial overlap of MPAs with the following layers:

) Areas of potential jurisdiction Recognizing that many areas are disputed,and that some countries have not yet ratied international conventions orregistered claims, our map here covers areas of potential jurisdiction ratherthan legally dened Exclusive Economic Zones. The gures are drawn outfrom the coastline to the nautical mile outer boundary or the interme-

diate boundary between nations. This information has been prepared atUNEP-WCMC from multiple sources.

) Marine Ecoregions of the World (MEOW) A set of intertidal and subtidalbiogeographic regions extending from the coast to the m depth con-tour, these form a nested hierarchy of ecoregions within provincesand realms.

) Pelagic Provinces of the World A set of biogeographic regions for the of-shelf epipelagic waters of the world, broadly aligned with the MEOW sys-tem, and non-overlapping.

) Benthic provinces A set of benthic biogeographic regions that provide anear total cover of benthic waters for bathyal (dened in this system asextending from m to , m deep) and abyssal (, to , m). An


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early draft version was published by UNESCO, but this version is modiedand was used in Toropova et al.

The results from this overlay were also compared with ndings from earlier studies,and are presented in maps and tables.

Results

This study reviewed , marine protected areas. These cover over . million kmor . percent of the global ocean area (Figure ). Table lists the worlds largestMPAs, with greater than , km marine coverage. A relatively small number ofvery large MPAs dominate the maps and statistics.

Biogeographic Coverage

As in previous studies the majority of MPAs lie in coastal and nearshore waters, withMPAs now covering . percent of continental shelf and equivalent areas (areasfrom the coastline to m depth: MEOW ecoregions). Of-shelf waters coverage

now stands at . percent of the worlds oceans, and the great majority of that is stilllocated relatively close to land, within jurisdictional waters.

F .The global coverage of MPAs. Although many MPAs include land areas, only marineportions are marked.

. UNESCO ed., Global Open Oceans and Deep Seabed (GOODS) BiogeographicClassication. (Paris: Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, UNESCO-IOC, );Toropova et al., n. above.


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Table .The MPAs with over , km of marine coverage

Site Name and Designation Country ofJurisdiction MarineExtent (km)

South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands Marine ProtectedArea

UK ,,

British Indian Ocean Territory Marine Protected Area (Chagos) UK ,

Kermadec Benthic Protection Area New Zealand ,

Phoenix Islands Protected Area and World Heritage Site Kiribati ,

Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument and WorldHeritage Site*

United States ,

Great Barrier Reef Marine Park and World Heritage Site Australia ,

Marianas Trench Marine National Monument United States ,

Pacic Remote Islands Marine National Monument United States ,

Motu Motiro Hiva Marine Park Chile ,

Prince Edward Islands Marine Protected Area South Africa ,

Reef Fish Longline and Buoy Federal Fishery ManagementZone**

United States ,

Macquarie Island Commonwealth Marine Reserve Australia ,

Charly-Gibbs Fracture Zone Marine Protected Area (OSPAR) High Seas ,

Galapagos Marine Reserve, World Heritage Site andUNESCO-MAB Biosphere Reserve

Ecuador ,

Greenland National Park and UNESCO-MAB Biosphere Reserve Greenland ,

Antipodes Transect Benthic Protection Area New Zealand ,

East Florida Coast Closed Area Federal FisheryManagement Zone**

United States ,

* This site also provides additional protection over percent of its extent through two FederalThreatened/Endangered Species Protected Areas (lobster closed area and longline protected area).** The WDPA includes a large number of sheries management areas that ofer only limited protec-tion and may not be widely enforced. There is ongoing discussion as to whether such sites conform tothe IUCN protected area denition.

Figure shows the MPA coverage by coastal and pelagic ecoregions. Annex provides summary statistics for the coastal biogeographic coverage while Annex summarizes the data for pelagic and benthic biogeographic provinces. As might beexpected, the ofshore pelagic and benthic biogeographic provinces are less well

represented, although two of the bathyal provinces have over percent MPAcoverage.

At the nest resolution there is considerable variation in MPA coverage incoastal waters some MEOW ecoregions have no MPA coverage, but ve of theselie in international or disputed waters. A further ecoregions have less thanone percent MPA coverage. By contrast ecoregions have over ten percent MPA


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coverage, with having over percent coverage. The latter areas are typically farfrom population centres.

Looking at broader MEOW regions, there is now MPA representation in each ofthe provinces. Four of the coastal realms have exceeded ten percent MPAcoverage, with the small Eastern Tropical Pacic realm having almost percentcoverage. By contrast, only two realms now have less than ve percent MPA cover-age: the Western Indo-Pacic and Temperate South America. Even these areas haveundergone considerable growth since the last assessment.

Political Coverage

The vast majority of MPAs fall within national jurisdictional areas. Their combinedcoverage represents . percent of this space. Of the countries and territoriesconsidered in this assessment, a total of countries and territories already haveover ten percent of their jurisdictional area incorporated into MPAs (Table ). Thisnumber represents a remarkable increase from just countries listing in . Thenumbers have been strongly boosted by the growth in very large sites ( of the jurisdictions in Table include mega-MPAs listed in Table ), but the expansion alsoextends to other areas where human use of marine space is intense, including member states of the European Union.

By contrast countries and territories ( percent of the total) have less than percent MPA coverage. This number includes countries and territories that haveno recorded MPAs. Some of these are small nations that do not greatly alter globalstatistics, while others are remote territories such as Pitcairn Island and Nauru,where relatively low levels of direct threats ofer some indication that there are stillconsiderable opportunities for biodiversity conservation.

F .MPA coverage by ecoregion and pelagic provinces. For ease of visualisation the MEOWecoregions are extended to nautical miles, but the coverage here refers only to continental

shelf and equivalent waters (down to m), which in some cases is a very narrow coastal strip.


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The MPA coverage of extra jurisdictional or high seas waters remains remarka-bly low. Designation in these waters requires the existence of some level of interna-

tional agreement and management. Thus far the existing areas recognized inthe WDPA have been declared in only two areas of international collaboration: theSouthern Ocean under the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine

Table .The countries or territories with over percent MPA coverage

Name No. of MPAs JurisdictionalArea (km)

MPA coverage Proportionunder MPAs

Monaco .%

British Indian Ocean Territory , , .%Slovenia .%

Gibraltar .%

South Georgia and The SouthSandwich Islands

,, ,, .%

Estonia , , .%

Germany , , .%

Belgium , , .%

Finland , , .%

Jordan .%

New Zealand ,, ,, .%

Northern Mariana Islands , , .%

France , , .%

Poland , , .%

Netherlands , , .%

Svalbard and Jan Mayen , , .%Denmark , , .%

Dominican Republic , , .%

Heard Island and McdonaldIslands

, , .%

Sudan , , .%

Ecuador ,, , .%

United States ,, ,, .%

United Arab Emirates , , .%

US Minor Outlying Islands* ,, , .%

Kiribati ,, , .%

(Continued)


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Living Resources (CCAMLR) and the North Atlantic under the Convention for theProtection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic (the OSPARConvention). Combined, these sites cover , km, which is . percent of thehigh seas.

Underlying Trends

The global statistics represent a continuing rapid increase in MPA coverage, withan apparent vefold increase in area over the last years (Figure ). This growth is

geographically widespread, as shown by the increases in every realm. These num-bers also draw attention to some important regional changes, including the increaseof protection in the temperate Northern Atlantic from . percent to . percentMPA coverage.

As shown in Table , a relatively small number of MPAs exert a considerableinuence over global statistics: the largest MPAs cover over million km, or percent of the entire global MPA coverage. These sites have been fundamental indriving changes, but there are other important trends and patterns in protectedareas designations, a number of which we highlight below:

New very large MPAs much of the growth over the last decade has been drivenby the designation of just a small number of very large sites. For example sincethe summary statistics the addition of just sites (South Georgiaand South Sandwich Islands Marine Protected Area; the British Indian OceanTerritory Marine Protected Area (Chagos); and Motu Motiro Hiva Marine Park,Chile), has added over . million km to the global total. These three sitesrepresent percent of the worlds MPA coverage.

The appearance of extensive high seas protected areas began only in 2010 withdeclaration of the South Orkney Islands Southern Shelf Marine Protected Area

and the six OSPAR MPAs in the North Atlantic, together adding over ,km.

The inclusion of sheries protected areas into global statistics is noteworthy, asare a number of very large tracts of ocean managed for sheries, notably FederalFisheries Management Zones in the US and Benthic Protection Areas in NewZealand. These categories alone cover , km and . million km

Table .(Cont.)

Name No. of MPAs JurisdictionalArea (km) MPA coverage Proportionunder MPAs

South Africa ,, , .%

Australia ,, , .%

Lithuania , .%

* For this statistic we excluded Midway and Kure, and Navassa Island in the Caribbean which areincluded in the mainland US statistics.


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respectively. While the New Zealand sites were only declared in and wereincluded in the assessment, some of the US sites date back to , buthave only recently been included in the WDPA.

The addition of international site designations has also had an important inu-ence. While sites covered under global agreements such as World Heritage andRamsar typically overlap existing sites and so will not alter statistics, a number

of regional conventions include sites that do not have other existing nationalprotection. Perhaps the most important for inuencing global statistics are theSpecial Protection Areas and Sites of Community Importance, declared underthe EU Birds Directive and Habitats Directive respectively. These add sites,covering some , km of European seas. Most of these sites are relativelynew, and so their appearance in this study does represent real growth to thenetwork rather than a change in approach.

In November the largest single addition to the global MPA network was madewith the declaration of . million kmof new sites around Australia, including the million kmCoral Sea Commonwealth Marine Reserve. These are not included inour main statistics, but they bring the total MPA coverage to .% of the globaloceans, and .% of jurisdictional waters. It is noteworthy that declaration was madewithout imposing any changes to management on the ground. Further rapid growthis to be expected, with . million kmcurrently being developed in new sites in theSouthern Cook Islands and New Caledonia alone.

F .Summary of MPA coverage from recent WDPA assessments.

Source: The statistic comes from this work. Sources for the other numbers are as follows: for : S. Chape,M. Spalding, and M. Jenkins, The Worlds Protected Areas. Status, Values, and Prospects in the Twenty-rst

Century (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, ); for : Wood et al., n. above; for :Spalding et al., n. above; and for : Spalding et al., n. above.


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. A. Balmford et al., The worldwide costs of marine protected areas,Proceedings ofthe National Academy of Sciences, no. (): .

MPA Coverage Summary

This brief analysis clearly shows recent dramatic increases in global MPA coverage.The geographic scope of MPA coverage is global, with notable increases in bothbiogeographic and political realms that were signicantly under-represented in ear-lier studies.

While high seas MPA coverage is still very low, the appearance of the rst sitesin the North Atlantic represents a signicant change and may ofer a precedent forother regional approaches for high seas MPAs. There are also further patterns in thecoverage. Most of the global statistics are driven by a small number of very large sitesand a review of these sites shows that many are located in remote locations, where

protection costs per unit area are relatively low and where there are fewer chal-lenges or conicts from local stakeholders.

Rates of progress suggest that it may well be possible to attain percent MPAcoverage by , but it is important to interpret such numbers with considerablecaution. Firstly, MPA coverage may not equate to protection sites may be inefec-tive due to failures in management or design. In addition, consideration of simplecoverage ignores some of the considerable challenges of placing MPAs in the mostefective settings to provide the most benet for marine biodiversity and for people.It also cannot provide any indication of how such sites are aligned with manage-

ment measures across wider seascapes and adjacent lands.It is clear that the global MPA estate still only provides a partial coverage of the

oceans. Despite rapid growth of protection there remain notable gaps in the globalMPA estate, whether looked at from a biogeographic or a political perspective. Suchmeasures, however, are only a partial picture: there may also be weaknesses in termsof what is being counted, or indeed excluded, from studies such as this. Aichi Target points to a need for a much broader perspective, both in terms of what is includedas spatial conservation measures, and the metrics against which such coverage isassessed. The following section will consider some of the challenges of using MPA

coverage as a primary metric of progress in marine conservation, and some of thewider needs for assessing progress in marine conservation eforts required underAichi Target .

III. ASSESSING PROGRESS TOWARDS TARGETS

The dramatic acceleration of MPA coverage in recent years, pointing as it does to avery real likelihood of attaining the areal extent targeted under international agree-

ments provides an important, even urgent, prompt to revisit precisely what is beingprotected and how much real protection is being achieved. As mentioned, Aichi


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. Dudley, n. above.. J. Day et al., Guidelines for Applying the IUCN Protected Area Management

Categories to Marine Protected Areas, IUCN, Best Practice Protected Area Guidelines Series(Gland, Switzerland, ); S. Wells and J. Day, Application of the IUCN protected area man-agement categories in the marine environment,Parks, no. (): .

. See USGS Gap Analysis Program: .. See National Marine Protected Areas Center: .

Target does not simply require MPA coverage, nor does it solely target biodiversity.In this section we rst consider what has been counted in this and earlier reviews of

MPA coverage, and what may have been left out. We then go on to consider progresson some of the other criteria specied under the Aichi Targets.

Spatial Coverage

What MPAs are Counted?

In looking at the global map and statistics for MPA coverage, it is important to beaware of what is included in terms of both denition and ecacy, but also at whatmay be missing. The denition of a protected area used by IUCN (and WDPA) is rela-tively broad. Sites must have nature conservation as a primary objective rather thanan incidental gain, but such conservation can be limited, even to just a subset ofspecies or habitats, or a subset of threats acting on any site. Such variability issometimes overlooked by those reading the statistics, but is important. Simple MPAcoverage assessments make no diferentiation between sites where there may justbe a few simple sheries or pollution regulations and others where no naturalresources can be extracted or that do not allow any access at all.

Associated with the broad denition is a range of interpretation by the datasuppliers to WDPA of which sites meet this denition, and while useful eforts haverecently been made to improve understanding of these denitions, the possibilityfor varied interpretation remains. This is perhaps best exemplied by the USA. Inrecent years there have been notable eforts to develop a centralized list of protectedareas, which in this large country include private, county, state, and federal pro-tected areas, with sites at each level being developed by multiple departments, sec-tors, or stakeholders. As a result, the task is not simple. Two groups have developeddatabases the Protected Areas Database of the US (PAD-US), managed by the

USGS Gap Analysis Program and the National Marine Protected Areas Center run byNOAA. Both groups have been collaborating with each other and indeed withWDPA to develop a common framework and classication and means of cross-walk-ing between national denitions and the IUCN denitions and management catego-ries. In reality there have been considerable challenges with this task. Both datasetscontain a number of spatial management measures that may not meet the IUCNdenition (such as narrowly targeted sheries regulations, seasonal or short-term
http://gapanalysis.usgs.gov/http://gapanalysis.usgs.gov/http://gapanalysis.usgs.gov/http://gapanalysis.usgs.gov/http://www.mpa.gov/http://www.mpa.gov/http://gapanalysis.usgs.gov/http://www.mpa.gov/


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. L. Wenzel, T. McTigue and M. DIorio, Marine Reserves in the United States, MPA

Center, NOAA Oce of Ocean and Coastal Resource Management (Silver Spring, Maryland,); L. Wenzel, M. DIorio and K. Yeager, Snapshot of United States MPAs, MPA Center,NOAA Oce of Ocean and Coastal Resource Management, (Silver Spring, Maryland, ).

. EC, Council Regulation (EC) No. / of September amendingRegulation (EC) No. / as regards the protection of deep-water coral reefs from theefects of shing in certain areas of the Atlantic Ocean, (Ocial Journal L : ), Vol./.

protection measures); however, there are other sites whose inclusion or exclusionunder the IUCN denition is unclear, perhaps even arbitrary. The MPAs currently

held in the WDPA for the USA and associated territories currently cover . percentof the US jurisdictional space, but sites include a number of very large areas withshery regulations that are limited in overall scope and that might not be consid-ered as MPAs by other countries. Two analyses from the MPA Center database pointto the extraordinary range of protection that can be generated using diferent MPAdenitions. Using their full listing of , sites, some percent of US jurisdictionalwaters fell within MPAs in . By contrast, ltering the database to only includemarine reserves (areas where extractive uses are forbidden) the list drops to only sites covering some . percent of US waters, with over percent of this area

being located in the Papahnaumokukea Marine National Monument in Hawaii.The decision on what level of sheries management to count as MPAs is not

only a debate in the USA. For example, WDPA contains New Zealands system ofBenthic Protection Areas, some of the largest MPAs in the world, where sheriesrestrictions prohibit benthic trawling and also protect a m vertical bufer abovethe seabed. Very similar regulations have been enacted in the European Union overmost of the waters around the Azores, Madeira, and the Canary Islands (where ben-thic trawling is not permitted, and nor is the use of a range of other shing gears atdepths below m). These sites are not in the WDPA, but they extend over

. million km. If they were included they would alter global statistics, and Portugaland Spain would become major MPA nations.

While other denitions exist, the IUCN denition of an MPA probably repre-sents something close to consensus, given the widespread involvement of govern-ments in providing data to WDPA, but there are clearly considerable challenges inapplying this denition, and there are likely inconsistencies in the database that arethe result of national level variation in decisions, interpretation, and even perhapsthe diligence of data providers. Given this, there would be considerable value inimproving the common understanding of the denition of an MPA. There is likely

also a need to think further about whether this denition is suciently useful as ametric for conservation progress. A great strength of the US databases mentionedabove is that they allow further scrutiny on the levels of protection, including theparticular targets and management approaches developed by diferent sites.


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. FAO, Marine protected areas and sheries, (Rome: Food and Agriculture

Organization of the United Nations, FAO Technical Guidelines for Responsible Fisheries,).

. Wenzel et al., n. above.. CBD, COP Seventh Ordinary Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the

Convention on Biological Diversity. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, February . DecisionVII/: Protected areas (Articles (a) to (e)), (United Nations Environment Programme,).

Other Efective Area-based Conservation Measures

In the negotiation of Aichi Target , a number of Parties to the CBD were concernedabout issues relating to inconsistencies of denitions of MPAs. There was also a gen-eral concern that the target should not be too narrowly dened, but be achievable ata relatively fast rate. These factors played an important part in the decision to addthe concept of other efective area-based conservation measures to be countedalongside MPAs under the revised Aichi Target . Unfortunately, beyond these ini-tial discussions there has been little debate as to what can be counted as other meas-ures, leaving a potentially large aw in the process that could undermine the overallpurpose of establishing a numerical target. Here we ofer three classes of other

measures that may be relevant and may merit further discussion and renement:

) From the original negotiations there is certainly a tacit recognition thatmany sites that do meet the denition of an MPA are simply not included inglobal or regional datasets. This may simply be a failure of reporting, fromthe oversight of certain sectors such as sheries, private, local or non-legal/traditional protected areas, through to an overly narrow interpretation ofthe protected area denitions.

) Other measures could also allow for the wider interpretation of how an

MPA might be dened. While IUCNs protected area denition is widelyused, there are others that are even broader in scope. FAO, for example,describes an MPA as any marine geographical area that is aforded greaterprotection than the surrounding waters for biodiversity conservation orsheries management purposes noting that such a denition could eveninclude some entire EEZ areas. This denition, like that of the US MPACenter described above, allows the inclusion of many large shery manage-ment areas. The CBD also has a denition that covers any dened area reserved with the efect that its marine and/or coastal biodiversity enjoys

a higher level of protection than its surroundings. Depending on inter-pretation such a denition could allow for many, perhaps all of the areascovered under regional sheries agreements and Regional FisheriesManagement Organizations.

) Both IUCN and to some degree FAO and others are focused on sites that aredeclared for biodiversity (and for sheries management in the case of FAO).In reality there are many other spatial management measures that achieve


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. M.J. Costello et al., A census of marine biodiversity knowledge, resources, andfuture challenges,PLoS ONE, no. (): e.

. L. Burke, K. Reytar, M. Spalding and A.L. Perry,Reefs at Risk Revisited(Washington,D.C.: World Resources Institute, The Nature Conservancy, WorldFish Center, International

remain a useful target. There may be a strong case for maintaining a broad deni-tion of both MPAs and other efective measures, but if this is done then further

thought may be needed to encourage, track, and report on a portfolio of protectionapproaches.

Further Criteria for Assessment

Of course measures of spatial extent alone cannot be directly equated to progress inattaining Aichi Target with its goal that percent of coastal and marine areas,especially areas of particular importance for biodiversityand ecosystem services, areconserved through efectively and equitably managed, ecologically representative and

well connected systemsof protected areas and other efective area-based conserva-tion measures, and integrated into the wider landscapes and seascapes (emphasisadded). Here we ofer brief thoughts on how such requirements might be assessedand some thoughts on progress relative to the target.

Important for Biodiversity and Ecologically Representative

Thanks to the relatively new global biogeographic classications, it is now possibleto have at least a partial view of ecological representation in the global MPA estate(Section II). Such classications, however, provide broad generalisations of patternsin the distribution of species, ecosystems and evolutionary processes. They do notcapture the ner distribution of individual habitats and species.

In order to support the conservation of biodiversity it is necessary not only thatbiodiversity should be fully incorporated into spatial conservation planning, butthat such planning should take into account the ecological needs of species as wellas wider ecosystem processes. Sites must contain suciently large populations oftarget species to ensure continued survival, with replication to provide additionalsecurity. Networks of sites must be built to allow for diferent life-history phases,including pelagic larval phases and migratory patterns. Increasing volumes of infor-mation are available at global levels on the distribution of diversity, and futureassessment could be made to at least gain a partial picture of species coverage (orsubsets such as threatened, endemic or keystone species). Habitat distribution mapsare less widely available at global scales but exceptions include systems often sin-gled out for attention, such as coral reefs and mangrove forests. Recent studies havesuggested that some of these are in fact well covered by MPAs ( percent of coralreefs and percent of mangrove forests), and further investigation along theselines can help to single out areas where there may still be gaps in MPA coverage.


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Coral Reef Action Network, UNEP World Conservation Monitoring Centre and Global Coral

Reef Monitoring Network, ); M.D. Spalding, M. Kainuma and L. Collins, World Atlas ofMangroves(London: Earthscan, ).

. CBD, Fourteenth meeting of the Subsidiary Body on Scientic, Technical andTechnological Advice, May , Nairobi, Kenya. XIV/. In-depth review of the imple-mentation of the programme of work on marine and coastal biological diversity, (UnitedNations Environment Programme, ).

. C.J. Klein, C. Steinback, M. Watts, A.J. Scholz and H.P. Possingham, Spatial marinezoning for sheries and conservation,Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment ():doi:./; J.A. Garcia-Charton et al., Efectiveness of European Atlanto-Mediterranean MPAs: Do they accomplish the expected efects on populations, communi-ties and ecosystems?,Journal for Nature Conservation, no. (): ; I. Tetreault

and R.F. Ambrose, Temperate marine reserves enhance targeted but not untargeted shes inmultiple no-take MPAs,Ecological Applications, no. (): ; J. Wielgus et al.,Coral reef quality and recreation fees in marine protected areas, Conservation Letters, no. (): ; E. Green and R. Donnelly, Recreational scuba diving in Caribbean marineprotected areas. Do the users pay?,Ambio, no. (): ; D.dA. Lafoley and G.Grimsditch, eds., The Management of Natural Coastal Carbon Sinks (Gland, Switzerland:IUCN, ). See also Leisher et al. and Roberts et al., n. above; and FAO, n. above.

One efort to help the process of identifying and prioritizing biodiversity con-servation in the open oceans and deep seas has been the drive to describe and map

Ecologically and Biologically Signicant Areas (EBSAs). Recognizing that detailedspatial data on biodiversity in such areas are not widely available this process hasalso utilized proxy indicators such as productivity, seabed morphology and oceancurrents to help identify priority areas for conservation attention.

Importance for Ecosystem Services

As mentioned, one of the most important distinguishing features of Aichi Target was the specic requirement that marine conservation should target ecosystem ser-vices as well as biodiversity. This change is not in fact a radical departure from widerconservation thinking the importance of nature for people was a dening featureof some of the earliest conservation agreements. But its specic inclusion in anAichi Target for spatial conservation eforts is important and may reect growingconcern of a failure to act upon this connection in some areas.

That MPAs and equivalent areas can indeed support the provision of ecosystemservices has long been an argument for their implementation. Much has beenwritten about the roles of protected areas in enhancing sheries, supporting tour-ism and recreation, in coastal protection, carbon sequestration, and poverty

reduction.As with biodiversity protection, however, not all MPAs are equivalent and a pro-

cess is needed to identify priorities and gaps in the global MPA coverage based ontheir role in enhancing ecosystem services. For most services, such enhancementwill be greatest close to populations who can directly benet from provisioning andcultural services; however, those same populations are often a cause of stress or


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. Burke et al., n. above.

impact on marine biodiversity, creating a paradox. Areas of greatest importancefor biodiversity often lie some distance from human populations, but those of great-

est importance for their ecosystem services are likely to lie close to humanpopulations.

In fact, it is the very existence of this paradox that makes the inclusion of eco-system services in Aichi Target so important. Conservation ofers a solution notonly to the problem of biodiversity loss, but also to declining ecosystem servicedelivery. Well-run, efective MPAs should be able to counter the negative impacts ofhumans on biodiversity, and should at the same time be able to provide for ongoingand higher value ecosystem services than unmanaged sites in the same location.Caution is needed, however. In certain settings the designation of MPAs can actually

reduce apparent values of certain ecosystem services, closing of avenues of incomeor food provision by reducing access or restricting harvests. This is particularly thecase if assessments only look at short-term inuences, only measure single benets,or do not look at spill-over benets to wider regions.

At present the greatest eforts towards MPA establishment are currently locatedaway from human populations. In a study of coral reef protected areas, Burke et al.noted that MPAs, particularly large sites, are located disproportionately in areas oflow shing pressure, and management efectiveness tends to be lower in areas ofhigh shing pressure. This same trend of MPAs being located away from human

populations is also illustrated in the comparison of MPA coverage with coastal pop-ulation density statistics by ecoregion in Figure .

Remote MPAs do of course protect some important ecosystem services: theymay be important refugia, nursery and spawning areas, or indeed ofer large-scaleregulating services such as water purication or climate regulation. Even so, it seemslikely that progress towards Aichi Target will require a greater focus on the high-value local ecosystem service benets that will require increasing focus on MPAsand equivalent areas closer to human populations. Achieving the revised AichiTarget requires setting in motion a process to guide Parties to identify areas that

best yield such services and better link to delivering social, cultural, and economicbenets to communities.

Efectively and Equitably Managed

Many sites set aside for conservation purposes are less efective than intended, dueto problems either in site design or in subsequent management, or both. Efectiveconservation requires both planning and implementation. Many protected areassufer from impacts arising beyond their boundaries and may be inefective in con-

serving their biota. Others may lack a suciently robust regulatory regime to achievetheir intended aims, or may be poorly designed with respect to key species or habi-tats, excluding key areas for certain species or life-history phases. For these, even


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. T. Agardy, G.N. di Sciara and P. Christie, Mind the Gap: Addressing the shortcom-ings of marine protected areas through large scale marine spatial planning,Marine Policy,

no. (): .. F. Leverington et al., A global analysis of protected area management efective-

ness,Environmental Management , no. (): ; R.S. Pomeroy, J.E. Parks andL.M. Watson,How is your MPA doing? A guidebook of natural and social indicators for evaluat-ing marine protected areas management efectiveness(IUCN, WWF and NOAA, ). Seealso Chape et al., n. above.

. Burke et al., n. above.

perfect application of the rules would be insucient. Yet more sites fail to be man-aged efectively: they lack the resources or the commitment to be managed accord-ing to their regulatory regime or management plan, or the rules are poorly understoodor implemented, and the biota is damaged or lost.

Although there have been a number of eforts to look at management efective-ness, there is, as yet, no means to assess this globally. Burke et al. were able to applya three-level scoring of efectiveness to coral reef MPAs worldwide and were able toscore , sites. Of these, only percent of sites were considered fully efective, percent partially efective and percent inefective.

F .A comparison of MPA coverage in coastal waters with coastal population density. Datafor both use the MEOW ecoregions as spatial units and some outlying ecoregions are labelled.

Coastal population densities were generated from CIESIN and CIAT population maps forpopulations within km of the coast.

Source: CIESIN CIAT, G P W V (GPWv), (Distributed by Centerfor International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN), Columbia University and Centro Internacional

de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT), Palisades, New York, ).


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. Mascia et al., n. above.. C.Y. Bartlett, K. Pakoa and C. Manua, Marine reserve phenomenon in the Pacic

islands,Marine Policy, no. (): .. P.H. Sand, Fortress conservation trumps human rights? The marine protected

area in the Chagos Archipelago,Journal of Environment and Development, no. ():; C.R.C. Sheppard et al., Reefs and islands of the Chagos Archipelago, Indian Ocean:Why it is the worlds largest no-take marine protected area,Aquatic Conservation: Marineand Freshwater Ecosystems(): . See also De Santo et al., n. above.

. Wood et al., n. above.

MPAs can bring considerable benets to adjacent communities, but they donot always do so. The reference to equitable management underlines the need for

ensuring stakeholder acceptance of MPAs, engaging them, as appropriate in the des-ignation and management of sites and any potential benets that might accrue.Such equity clearly lies at the heart of many new movements in conservation,including the Locally Managed Marine Area (LMMA) movement, as well as manynew sheries regulations such as spatial quotas and Territorial Use Rights in Fisheries(TURFs). Even so, some new MPAs have been accused of failing to achieve suchagreement, perhaps most notably the celebrated Indian Ocean marine reserve inthe Chagos Archipelago, which has won considerable acclaim as the worlds largestno-take zone, but which is being challenged in courts and in ongoing debate for fail-

ing to garner the support of the Chagossian Islanders or the Mauritian Governmentthat also claims sovereignty over the islands.

Well-connected Systems

Marine biodiversity, more so than terrestrial, is highly interconnected over very largespatial scales. This occurs not only because of the dynamic, uid nature of the oceanenvironment, but also because even apparently sedentary species typically havedispersal phases as eggs or larvae, during which they may travel vast distances.

Furthermore, pelagic species, from plankton to the great whales, have vast rangesover which they may drift or actively migrate. Many threats too, such as pollutionand disease, are widely and rapidly dispersed. These two factors raise the impor-tance that conservation eforts are not isolated, but that MPAs are built into a net-work. Such a network will allow natural patterns of movements, as well as provideresilience in the face of impacts.

Wood et al. assessed the connectedness of MPAs, taking minimum size forMPAs and maximum distances for larval dispersal from earlier authors. They esti-mated as a lower bound that only percent of MPAs (but percent by area) could

be considered part of a network, while the higher bound was percent of MPAs( percent by area). Such gures have likely increased following the threefoldincrease in MPA coverage since that publication, but such gures only discuss theconnectedness of existing sites, and must be considered alongside the completegaps in the network.


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Recent trends in MPA coverage suggest that global coverage could reach per-cent by . Using a broader denition of MPAs and equivalent areas there is even

a risk that some might claim that such a level has already been reached. Such appar-ent success, however, would mask some signicant failings, and it is critically impor-tant to realize that Aichi Target calls for a great deal more than MPA coverage.

Part of this caution arises from a number of concerns that have been raised inearlier publications. Many MPAs may be inefective or partially efective, due to fail-ure in design or management, and so their role in achieving conservation aims isminimal. Notwithstanding such concerns, the global coverage of MPAs is still un-even, meaning that the system, such as it is, is far from representative. Targets suchas Aichi are not intended to be a single global end-point, but are calling for progress

across both ecological and political space. Biogeographic reviews represent the besttool currently available for assessing ecological coverage and the present studyshows progress, but also signicant gaps with over a quarter of ecoregions beingvery far from the target and having less than percent MPA coverage. Politically thisuneven spread is even stronger, with percent of countries and territories havingless than percent MPA coverage.

There are also concerns about what is being measured. Protected areas, asdened by IUCN, are a highly variable array of management interventions. The Aichiinclusion of other spatial measures enables further broadening of this denition.

The result is that many extremely large sites could potentially be counted towardsthe overall goal. There are of course considerable benets from using a broad rangeof management approaches, which enable diferent levels of use, and facilitate tar-geting key pressures, or safeguarding particular elements of biodiversity, social oreconomic value. At the same time the considerable benets from stricter levels ofprotection (including no-take areas or marine reserves) must be acknowledged.

There is an urgent need to more clearly specify denitions of protection withinthe general Aichi framework. We would recommend that such specication wouldrecognize the diversity of management approaches, but would also require that

stricter levels of protection should be seen as an integral part of spatial conservationmeasures, and even that countries should be encouraged to set sub-targets for theinclusion of such areas.

Over and above these cautions, there is also a need to recognize that AichiTarget was not simply a re-armation of earlier targets. Rather, in the develop-ment of the targets there was considerable discussion about new elements. Theseincluded the need for equitably managed sites, placed within a wider framework,and above all, the clear identication of the importance of conserving ecosystemservices.

In order to better direct marine conservation eforts, there is therefore anurgent need to develop better measures to target and prioritize the protection ofecosystem services. We need to understand the distribution of ecosystem servicesand the potential benets to these services that could be achieved through theimplementation of MPAs and equivalent areas. Just as the CBD Secretariat and otherinternational agencies have invested heavily in the development and promotion of


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Annex .Protected areas coverage in coast and shelf waters (Marine Ecoregions of the Worldsubdivisions) summarised to Realm and Province

Realm Province Total Area(km)

MPAcoverage(km)

Proportion inMPAs

Proportion inMPAs

Arctic ,, , .% .%

Arctic ,, , .%

Temperate Northern Atlantic ,, , .% .%

Black Sea , , .%

Cold Temperate Northwest

Atlantic

, , .%

Lusitanian , , .%

Mediterranean Sea , , .%

Northern European Seas ,, , .%

Warm Temperate NorthwestAtlantic

, , .%

Temperate Northern Pacic ,, , .% .%

Cold Temperate Northeast Pacic , , .%

Cold Temperate Northwest Pacic ,, , .%

Warm Temperate NortheastPacic

, , .%

Warm Temperate NorthwestPacic

, , .%

Tropical Atlantic ,, , .% .%

Gulf of Guinea , , .%

North Brazil Shelf , , .%

St. Helena and Ascension Islands , .% Tropical Northwestern Atlantic ,, , .%

Tropical Southwestern Atlantic , , .%

West African Transition , , .%

Western Indo-Pacic ,, , .% .%

Andaman , , .%

Bay of Bengal , , .%

Central Indian Ocean Islands , , .%

Red Sea and Gulf of Aden , , .%

Somali/Arabian , , .%

West and South Indian Shelf , , .%

Western Indian Ocean , , .%

(Continued)


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Annex .(Cont.)

Realm Province Total Area(km)

MPAcoverage(km)

Proportion inMPAs

Proportion inMPAs

Central Indo-Pacic ,, , .% .%

Eastern Coral Triangle , , .%

Java Transitional , , .%

Lord Howe and Norfolk Islands , , .%

Northeast Australian Shelf , , .%

Northwest Australian Shelf , , .%

Sahul Shelf ,, , .%

South China Sea , , .%

South Kuroshio , , .%

Sunda Shelf ,, , .%

Tropical Northwestern Pacic , , .%

Tropical Southwestern Pacic , , .%

Western Coral Triangle , , .%

Eastern Indo-Pacic , , .% .%

Central Polynesia , , .%

Easter Island .%

Hawaii , , .%

Marquesas , .%

Marshall, Gilbert and Ellis Islands , , .%

Southeast Polynesia , .%

Tropical Eastern Pacic , , .% .% Galapagos , , .%

Tropical East Pacic , , .%

Temperate South America ,, , .% .%

Juan Fernndez andDesventuradas

, .%

Magellanic , , .%

Tristan Gough , .%

Warm Temperate SoutheasternPacic

, , .%

Warm Temperate SouthwesternAtlantic

, , .%

Temperate Southern Africa , , .% .%

Agulhas , , .%

(Continued)


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Annex .(Cont.)

Realm Province Total Area(km) MPAcoverage(km)

Proportion inMPAs Proportion inMPAs

Amsterdam-St Paul .%

Benguela , , .%

Temperate Australasia ,, , .% .%

East Central Australian Shelf , , .%

Northern New Zealand , , .%

Southeast Australian Shelf , , .%

Southern New Zealand , , .%

Southwest Australian Shelf , , .%

West Central Australian Shelf , , .%

Southern Ocean , , .% .%

Continental High Antarctic , .%

Scotia Sea , , .%

Sub-Antarctic Islands , , .%

Sub-Antarctic New Zealand , , .%

Annex .Protected areas coverage in ofshore waters, including pelagic waters that arecontinuous and non-overlapping with the MEOW ecoregions, and the benthic provinces that lie

below the pelagic systems and are subdivided into bathyal and abyssal

PROVINCE Total ProvinceArea (km)

MPA coverage (km) ProportionProtected

PELAGIC

Agulhas Current ,, .%

Antarctic ,, ,, .%

Antarctic Polar Front ,, , .%

Arctic ,, , .%

Benguela Current ,, .%

Black Sea , .%

California Current ,, , .%

Canary Current ,, , .%Eastern Tropical Pacic ,, , .%

Equatorial Atlantic ,, .%

Equatorial Pacic ,, , .%

(Continued)


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Annex .(Cont.)



Guinea Current , .%

Gulf Stream ,, , .%

Humboldt Current ,, .%

Indian Ocean Gyre ,, , .%

Indian Ocean Monsoon Gyre ,, , .%

Indonesian Through-Flow ,, , .%

Inter-American Seas ,, , .%

Kuroshio ,, .%

Leeuwin Current ,, .

Malvinas Current , .%

Mediterranean ,, , .%

Non-gyral Southwest Pacic ,, , .%

North Atlantic Transitional ,, , .%

North Central Atlantic Gyre ,, , .%

North Central Pacic Gyre ,, , .%

North Pacic Transitional ,, .%

Red Sea , .%

Sea of Japan/East Sea , .%

Somali Current ,, , .%

South Central Atlantic Gyre ,, , .%

South Central Pacic Gyre ,, ,, .%South China Sea ,, , .%

Sub-Antarctic ,, , .%

Sub-Arctic Atlantic ,, .%

Sub-Arctic Pacic ,, , .%

Subtropical Convergence ,, , .%

Subtotal ,, ,, .%

BATHYAL

Antarctic ,, , .%

Arctic ,, , .%

Cocos Plate ,, , .%

Indian ,, , .%

(Continued)


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Annex .(Cont.)



Nazca Plate ,, .%

New Zealand Kermadec ,, , .%

North Atlantic ,, , .%

North Pacic ,, , .%

Northern North Atlantic ,, , .%

Northern North Pacic ,, , .%

SE Pacic Ridges ,, , .%

South Atlantic ,, , .%

Sub-Antarctic ,, , .%

West Pacic ,, , .%

Subtotal ,, ,, .%

ABYSSAL

Angola and Sierra LeoneBasins

,, -

Arctic ,, -

Argentine Basin ,, -

Brazil Basin ,, , .%

Central Pacic ,, , .%

East Antarctic Indian ,, , .%

East Pacic Basins ,, , .%

Indian ,, , .%

North Atlantic ,, , .%North Central Pacic ,, , .%

North Pacic ,, .%

South Pacic ,, , .%

West Antarctic ,, , .%

West Pacic Basins ,, , .%

Subtotal ,, ,, .%

protecting marine spaces global targets and changing approaches

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