Over-fishing, habitat destruction and pollution are harming much of the world's oceans and the life within them. For instance, recent studies have shown that the biomass of 'food' or high tropic level fishes in the North Atlantic have declined by two-thirds since the early 1950s, and that world fisheries catches have been declining by about 700 thousand tonnes per year since the late 1980s. Recent scientific evidence show that 'fencing off' parts of the sea, in marine protected areas (MPAs), where fishing and other human uses are closely regulated is a good strategy that can help protect, and possibly restore ocean richness and marine biodiversity. Hence, there seem to be clear ecological advantages to MPA establishment, but what are the economic pro's and con's? Until now, there has been little coordinated effort to explore economic questions related to the creation of MPAs.
Sample Results
The goal of a protected area, as its name suggests, is to protect a specified location from certain human impacts. Marine Protected Areas are simply protected areas in the ocean – designated ocean spaces within which human activities are regulated more stringently than elsewhere, typically to achieve certain conservation objectives. The regulation of human uses can range in format from marine reserves ('no-take' areas in which any form of extraction is prohibited) to 'zoned' areas in which a variety of uses are permitted to some extent and managed in an integrated manner. MPAs are of great interest both in fishery management and as a tool for 'integrated ocean management', dealing not only with fishing but also ocean tourism, mining, aquaculture, and so on.
While the successful development and implementation of MPAs clearly involves biological and technical matters, as big a challenge lies on the human side – with connections between MPAs, ocean users and coastal communities, and the task of maximizing overall benefits for society. After all, the implementation of MPAs – like human actions of any sort – produces both benefits and costs. Furthermore, these benefits and costs do not appear uniformly: some may benefit (or suffer) more than others, and both benefits and costs may appear at different stages in time.
Information on how to get hold of copies of the special issues can be obtained by emailing to rmmc@asu.edu
For further information please contact:
Ussif Rashid Sumaila
Fisheries Economics Research Unit
Fisheries Centre
University of British Columbia
Vancouver, B.C. V6T 1Z4
Canada
1-604-822-0224
r.sumaila@fisheries.ubc.ca
Anthony Charles
Management Science / Environmental Studies
Saint Mary's University
Halifax N.S. Canada B3H 3C3
1-902-420-5732
t.charles@smu.ca
John Hearne
Editor, Natural Resource Modeling
Department of Mathematics
University of Natal
Private Bag X01 3209
Scottsville, South Africa
hearne@nu.ac.za
Natural Resource Modeling