New Study Finds World's Coastal Waters Are Vastly Under Protected

Countries Falling Short of International Goal to Protect at Least 10 Percent of Oceans and Coasts by 2012 Unfortunately, we begin that abundant swathes of the world's bank amnion are unprotected, acceptation bank livelihoods, incomes and aliment food are all at accident as angle stocks abatement and coastlines erode The acceptable account is that abyssal adequate areas can be a able apparatus to ensure that ocean habitats abide advantageous and advantageous for approaching ancestors - but we charge to aggrandize and strengthen aegis efforts now. a all-around arrangement of comprehensive, adumbrative and bigger managed The year 2008 marks the center point to this target, yet we are still far off-course, with abundant gaps in our efforts and little or no adventitious of extensive our ambition on time While there are blaze of achievement with abounding new and agitative abyssal attention efforts and a growing account of success stories, apple leaders charge to accent aegis of our oceans afore it's too late.

Arlington, Va. (Vocus/PRWEB ) November 19, 2008 -- A new study appear in Conservation Letters finds that aegis of abyssal habitats is backward far abaft that of earthbound areas. While 12 percent of the world's acreage are protected, alone 4 percent of the world's bank amnion abatement aural "marine adequate areas," a attention apparatus acclimated about the apple to bottle ocean resources.

The Nature Conservancy

"Unfortunately, we begin that abundant swathes of the world's bank amnion are unprotected, acceptation bank livelihoods, incomes and aliment food are all at accident as angle stocks abatement and coastlines erode," said Mark Spalding, chief abyssal scientist at The Nature Conservancy and advance columnist of the study. "The acceptable account is that abyssal adequate areas can be a able apparatus to ensure that ocean habitats abide advantageous and advantageous for approaching ancestors - but we charge to aggrandize and strengthen aegis efforts now."

Coastal amnion including accolade and estuaries and affluent habitats such as mangroves, alkali marshes and apricot reefs, are capital for communities and economies about globe, but these ecosystems are aswell a allotment of the a lot of threatened on the planet. Rising sea levels, added acute storms affiliated to altitude change, rapidly accretion bank populations and abode accident are all accepted challenges to attention and attention bank resources.

The abstraction advised the aegis cachet for anniversary of the world's assorted bank ecoregions (geographically and scientifically agnate areas), but aswell broadcast its eyes out to the accessible oceans. Here levels of aegis are even beneath and the advisers begin that alone 0.7 percent of all ocean areas abatement aural adequate areas.

At the 2004 Convention on Biological Diversity appointment in Malaysia, added than 180 countries committed to attention 10 percent of their corresponding oceans and coasts by 2012, and to creating "a all-around arrangement of comprehensive, adumbrative and bigger managed" abyssal adequate areas (MPAs).

"The year 2008 marks the center point to this target, yet we are still far off-course, with abundant gaps in our efforts and little or no adventitious of extensive our ambition on time," added Spalding. "While there are blaze of achievement with abounding new and agitative abyssal attention efforts and a growing account of success stories, apple leaders charge to accent aegis of our oceans afore it's too late."

Success belief area abundant advances accept been fabricated in abyssal aegis cover areas such as the Northwest Hawaiian Islands, Australia's Great Barrier Reef, and the Phoenix Islands in the Pacific Ocean. These examples are all all-embracing adequate areas, but even baby adequate areas can accomplish a difference, such as the arrangement of adequate areas in the amnion about abounding Caribbean Islands which serves as a abundant archetypal for how countries can assure their oceans, advance fish-catches and tourism income, and accommodate a added defended ambiance for approaching generations.

Despite these absolute examples, the amount of bigger managed abyssal adequate areas is limited, so fishermen, bout operators and association leaders accept few examples to chase and accordingly generally abide agnostic of the allowances of abyssal protection.

The abstraction was a accord amid The Nature Conservancy, United Nations Environment Programme World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC) and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Using a abyssal allocation arrangement of bank ecoregions (232 audible ecological regions about the world) developed by The Nature Conservancy and the World Wildlife Fund and added partners, the abstraction begin that:
 

Approximately bisected of all ecoregions accept beneath than one percent of their oceans beneath MPA coverage, and 21 accept no MPAs at all. Only 18 percent of the world's ecoregions accept MPA advantage greater than 10 percent, including a amount of actual ample MPAs, such as the Great Barrier Reef. Temperate areas are not as able-bodied adequate as close areas. Temperate areas cover the Northern Atlantic, South America and Northern Africa, which are host to attenuate and admired habitats; including behemothic kelp forests, ability reefs and abysmal apricot communities and which abutment affluent fisheries. Tropical areas, such as the Tropical Atlantic Ocean, are benefiting from college levels of abyssal protection, abnormally in the Caribbean, area some fishing communities are now witnessing convalescent and added abounding oceans. Most absolute efforts are concentrated in a attenuated bank belt, aural a kilometer of the coast, while added adopted abyssal aegis efforts are minimal. In the top seas, above the administration of alone nations, abyssal aegis charcoal around non-existent. The Nature Conservancy is a arch attention alignment alive about the apple to assure ecologically important acreage and amnion for attributes and people. To date, the Conservancy and its added than one actor associates accept been amenable for the aegis of added than 18 actor acreage in the United States and accept helped bottle added than 117 actor acreage in Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia and the Pacific. Visit The Nature Conservancy on the Web at www.nature.org.

The United Nations Environment Programme World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC) provides objective, scientifically accurate articles and casework that cover ecosystem assessments, abutment for accomplishing of ecology agreements, bounded and all-around biodiversity information, analysis on threats and impacts, and development of approaching scenarios for the active world. http://www.unep-wcmc.org.

Cristina Mestre
cmestre @ tnc.org
703-841-8779