Combining information from benthic community analysis and social studies to establish no‐take zones within a multiple uses marine protected area

Abstract

ABSTRACT1. A decision support tool was used to determine priority sites for marine conservation within the Isla Grande de Atacama multiple uses marine protected area (MUMPA) in northern Chile, based on both biological and social information. Scuba diving, and an unweighted paired-group method using arithmetic average (UPGMA) analyses were used to determine the main benthic communities found in the shallow rocky and soft-sediment subtidal.2. To establish the costs of conservation, a social survey was undertaken to identify major users, uses and localities within the MUMPA. A multi-layer database with biological, physical, and social information was generated and further defined 28 approximately 70 ha analysis units. Explicit conservation criteria were then determined and four conservation goals defined (protection of 10, 20, 50, and 70% of each of the communities).3. Seven rocky reef and three soft-sediment communities were identified in the shallow subtidal. Four of the 28 units had high costs of conservation owing to high frequency of use by fishermen, divers, and algae harvesters (main users). These areas represented the highest risks for potential conflicts with the main users.4. Under the conservation goals of 10% and 20%, 36.8 and 44.4% of the whole marine area were selected as priority areas for protection respectively. The units selected presented low and medium costs of conservation, thus they had low risks of potential conflicts with users.5. This is the first study that uses a decision support tool to identify priority sites (i.e. units) in the shallow subtidal based on benthic communities and also incorporates social aspects to assess conservation costs. The use of social aspects enables the establishment of management strategies that agree both with biodiversity conservation and socio-economic development of fishing communities. This approach can be replicated for the planning of other coastal MPAs where artisanal fisheries and tourist activities co-occur and interact with conservation efforts.

Marine reserve establishment and on-going management costs: A case study from New Zealand

“…This means identifying locations where they catch the same amount of fish (their quota) whilst trying to avoid extra costs. Fishers will likely try to maximise their profits by using their local knowledge [23] and individual skill [24] to decide which locations will be most suitable. Given the importance of this relocation, it is important to understand the costs involved in this decision making process in order to evaluate the full costs of MPA designation.…”

The Challenge of Managing Marine Biodiversity: A Practical Toolkit for a Cartographic, Territorial Approach

“…Both ecology and socioeconomy, which are the two sides of coastal management that EBM aims to reconcile, have a long cartographic tradition and their employment may allow for the spatial segregation of human uses conflicting with ecosystem conservation [26,27]. Seafloor mapping has been a primary tool for the analysis and knowledge of marine ecosystems for decades [28,29].…”

Merging top‐down and bottom‐up approaches in marine protected areas planning: experiences from around the globe

“…However, as with most of the MPAs created in Chile, it was a top-down process where local communities were not consulted or involved in the planning and establishment process (Thiel et al, 2007;Gaymer et al, 2013). As a result of such a top-down approach, several Chilean MPAs have been resisted by local communities (Thiel et al, 2007;Jorquera-Jaramillo et al, 2012) and some of them have failed to be implemented, remaining as paper MPAs (Rojas-Nazar et al, 2012;Cárcamo and Gaymer, 2013).…”