One of the key management tools for a new vision for our oceans and the high seas – a vision that protects ocean resources and the rights of coastal communities – is the idea of the marine protected area, a swath of ocean off limits to commercial fishing and other large scale extractive industrial practices.
Several recent new stories highlight the progress that we are making towards creating a network of marine reserves.
The first piece of good news focuses on California’s Channel Islands. In 2003, 110 square nautical miles of marine reserves were created with a primary goal of restricting commercial fishing activities in order to protect key marine habitats like kelp forests.
This month, marking the five year anniversary of the creation of the marine reserves, studies are finding that the size and abundance of fish inside of the network of reserves are greater than those outside of the reserves.
While the effect on the commercial fisheries is mixed with the value of some fisheries outside of the network of reserves rising will others are decreasing, there has been an overall increase in recreational fishing outside of the reserves.
The results of the test case of the Channel Islands come at an important time, as California is working on the design and implementation of the Marine Life Protection Act which is creating a network of marine reserves all along our coast. The overall positive news strengthens the case – biologically and economically – for the value of marine protected areas.
In other positive news this month, the nation of Kiribati in the Pacific has created the world’s largest marine reserve, an area the size of California. Kiribati is noted for having one of the Earth’s last intact coral archipelagos.
A key component of the marine reserve is that while not permitting commercial fishing, the government is still allowing susbsistence fishing by local fishing communities. However, the challenges of making this marine reserve also will be on a grand scale, especially in terms of enforcement of the rules of the reserve over such a vast area and in the idea of substituting income from commercial fishing with income from ecotourism, especially in an area that is far from the United States, Europe, and even Australia.
