Marine Protected Area - Effectiveness

Effectiveness

Managers and scientists use geographic information systems and remote sensing to map and analyze MPAs. NOAA Coastal Services Center compiled an "Inventory of GIS-Based Decision-Support Tools for MPAs." The report focuses on GIS tools with the highest utility for MPA processes. Remote sensing uses advances in aerial photography image capture, satellite imagery, acoustic data, and radar imagery.

MPAs have also been recognized as an effective tool to maintain localized fish populations. The general concept is to create an area where the local populations of sea creatures can thrive and create a localized over population. When this over population occurs, the extra creatures will expand into the surrounding areas, known as spillover. This, in turn, helps support the local fisheries and the areas surrounding the MPA, while maintaining a healthy population. Such uses of the MPA have been seen in many areas around the world, but most commonly in very densely population areas like coral reefs.

Marine protected areas are an especially important management tool for coral reef systems worldwide. Over the past two centuries, coral reef systems have been in great decline due to overfishing and pollution. Currently, 30% of the world's reefs are already severely damaged, and approximately 60% of the reefs will be lost by 2030 if actions are not taken to recover and protect them. Coral Reef Systems are also facing extinction due to changes in the chemistry of the ocean and the rising ocean temperatures, both caused by global climate change. Marine protected areas are currently the best tool for managing the impacts to coral reefs, with "no take zones" acting as the most effective form of management. Though marine protected areas and no-take zones cannot stop the effects of global climate change, these management tools can protect the coral reefs from human damage and exploitation, allowing the reefs and the species they house to build resilience to recover from the changes brought by global climate change more effectively and rapidly.