The perils and promise of futures analysis in marine ecosystem-based management

Ecosystem-based management is now widely accepted as the standard strategy for achieving sustainable delivery of marine and estuarine ecosystem services. The ubiquity and rate of change in marine ecosystems necessitate incorporating visions of future ecosystem states into ecosystem management strategies. Creating visions of the future enables policy makers to set realistic objectives and targets, and to explore the consequences of potential management decisions on ecosystems under multiple potential scenarios of change. Several classes of futures are used in marine ecosystem management program, and three are highlighted here: visioning, predictive models, and scenario analysis. Each approach is briefly described, and their use in current marine ecosystem management programs in North America is reviewed. In particular, the importance of using scenario analysis to identify and incorporate the influence of exogenous drivers into management strategies is highlighted. Then, some of the perils and promises associated with each approach are described, and a way forward is proposed that incorporates multiple types of future envisioning approaches into management programs. Key contributions of future analyses include highlighting connections and trade-offs among ecosystem components, setting realistic targets, and incorporating exogenous drivers, and their uncertainties, into ecosystem management programs.     

Resilience: What is it and what does it mean for marine policymakers?

Marine policymakers are facing increasing calls to consider the resilience of communities that rely on coastal and marine ecosystem goods and services, and the resilience of natural systems themselves. These calls are in response to increasing threats to coastal communities from external factors such as coastal hazards, possibly associated with climate change, reductions in natural capital often caused by over-fishing and invasive species, and drivers that act to change local and regional economic conditions leading to changes in employment and inequality. However, most communities have had little experience in explicitly managing for resilience. Similarly, our understanding of the factors that make a natural or social system resilient is also somewhat limited. Furthermore, there is a lack of consensus-based definitions and performance measures for assessing resilience. These factors, along with other barriers, will need to be overcome before effective resilience-based management can be implemented.     

New metrics for managing and sustaining the ocean's bounty

Policies are arising around the world, most recently in the United States, that mandate the implementation of marine spatial planning as a practical pathway towards ecosystem-based management. In the new United States ocean policy, and several other cases around the globe, ecosystem services are at the core of marine spatial planning, but there is little guidance on how ecosystem services should be measured, making it hard to implement this new approach. A new framework is shown here for practical, rigorous ecosystem service measurement that highlights contributions from both natural and social systems. The novel three-step framework addresses traditional shortcomings of an ecosystem services approach by giving managers and scientists the tools to assess and track: (1) the condition of the ecosystem (supply metrics), (2) the amount of ocean resources actually used or enjoyed by people (service metrics), and (3) people's preference for that level of service (value metrics). This framework will allow real world progress on marine spatial planning to happen quickly, and with a greater chance for success.     

Towards an ecosystem-based approach of Guam's coral reefs: The human dimension

Management of tropical reef ecosystems under pressure from terrestrial and extractive marine activities is not straightforward, especially when the interests of extractive and non-extractive marine resource sectors compete. Before implementing management actions, potential outcomes of alternative management strategies can be evaluated in order to avoid adverse or unintended consequences. In tropical reef ecosystems the continued existence of the cultural and recreational fishing activities and the economically important dive-based tourism and recreation industry rest on sustainably managed marine resources. Through a case study of Guam, an ecosystem model was linked with human behavior models for participation in fishing and diving to evaluate future socio-ecological impacts of different management options. Ecosystem indices for reef status and resilience, and extraction potential were identified to evaluate the performance of alternative management scenarios. These marine ecosystem indices link the natural system to human uses (fishing and dive-based tourism and recreation). Evaluating management scenarios indicate that applying a single management tool, such as input controls or marine preserves, without also managing the watershed, is suboptimal. Combining different management tools has negative near-term costs, particularly for the fishing sector, but these are likely to be outweighed by the long-term benefits obtained from greater species abundance. Adopting watershed management measures in addition to fishery regulations distributes the burden for improving the reef status across multiple sectors that contribute to reef pressures.     

Making the ecosystem approach operational—Can regime shifts in ecological- and governance systems facilitate the transition?

Effectively reducing cumulative impacts on marine ecosystems requires co-evolution between science, policy and practice. Here, long-term social–ecological changes in the Baltic Sea are described, illustrating how the process of making the ecosystem approach operational in a large marine ecosystem can be stimulated. The existing multi-level governance institutions are specifically set up for dealing with individual sectors, but do not adequately support an operational application of the ecosystem approach. The review of ecosystem services in relation to regime shifts and resilience of the Baltic Sea sub-basins, and their driving forces, points to a number of challenges. There is however a movement towards a new governance regime. Bottom-up pilot initiatives can lead to a diffusion of innovation within the existing governance framework. Top-down, enabling EU legislation, can help stimulating innovations and re-organizing governance structures at drainage basin level to the Baltic Sea catchment as a whole. Experimentation and innovation at local to the regional levels is critical for a transition to ecosystem-based management. Establishing science-based learning platforms at sub-basin scales could facilitate this process.     

Essential ecological insights for marine ecosystem-based management and marine spatial planning

The abrupt decline in the sea's capacity to provide crucial ecosystem services requires a new ecosystem-based approach for maintaining and recovering biodiversity and integrity. Ecosystems are places, so marine spatial planners and managers must understand the heterogeneity of biological communities and their key components (especially apex predators and structure-forming species), and of key processes (e.g., population connectivity, interaction webs, biogeochemistry) that maintain them, as well as heterogeneity of human uses. Maintaining resistance and resilience to stressors is crucial. Because marine populations and ecosystems exhibit complex system behaviors, managers cannot safely assume they will recover when stressors are reduced, so prevention is a far more robust management strategy than seeking a cure for degraded systems.     

人地复合生态系统韧性研究进展及其对海岸带生态系统韧性研究的启示

在全球气候变化与人类高强度开发的双重影响下,人地复合生态系统和受陆海系统交互影响的海岸带地区生态脆弱性更加明显。如何有效把握人地复合生态系统发展动向,合理规划与调控社会经济活动、促进人地关系协调发展一直是可持续发展领域研究的重点课题。韧性作为系统的内在特征,在防范化解灾害风险、维护区域生态安全中发挥着重要作用,是人地复合生态系统可持续发展能力的重要表现。然而,目前关于人地复合生态系统韧性的内涵、评估方法等方面尚未形成统一的范式,韧性的量化评估方法存在较大差异。通过梳理和归纳现有研究成果认为,韧性经历了从工程韧性、生态韧性到演进韧性的转变,其概念及内涵仍在不断拓展与深化;总结对比了基于过程形成性和状态总结性的韧性评估方法发现,将韧性作为过程与结果的综合评估研究仍较为缺乏;在抵抗扰动、维持稳定和协调发展的韧性理念下,生态系统的保护与修复等将是区域可持续发展应用中人地复合生态系统安全的重要保障。根据人地复合生态系统韧性研究进展的分析结果,结合海岸带生态系统韧性研究的现状及不足,认为未来需要在加强海岸带生态系统韧性内涵挖掘、完善海岸带生态系统韧性评价体系、提高海岸带生态系统韧性监测精度、促进学...     

Securing ocean benefits for society in the face of climate change

Benefits humans rely on from the ocean – marine ecosystem services – are increasingly vulnerable under future climate. This paper reviews how three valued services have, and will continue to, shift under climate change: (1) capture fisheries, (2) food from aquaculture, and (3) protection from coastal hazards such as storms and sea-level rise. Climate adaptation planning is just beginning for fisheries, aquaculture production, and risk mitigation for coastal erosion and inundation. A few examples are highlighted, showing the promise of considering multiple ecosystem services in developing approaches to adapt to sea-level rise, ocean acidification, and rising sea temperatures.Ecosystem-based adaptation in fisheries and along coastlines and changes in aquaculture practices can improve resilience of species and habitats to future environmental challenges. Opportunities to use market incentives – such as compensation for services or nutrient trading schemes – are relatively untested in marine systems. Relocation of communities in response to rising sea levels illustrates the urgent need to manage human activities and investments in ecosystems to provide a sustainable flow of benefits in the face of future climate change.     

‘Doing the right thing’: How social science can help foster pro-environmental behaviour change in marine protected areas

Managers of marine protected areas (MPAs) are constantly challenged to encourage positive user behaviour to minimise impacts on marine ecosystems while allowing recreational use. Yet, some marine users continue to act in ways that diminish conservation values of the area. Drawing on social psychological theories, this paper presents a case for informed behaviour change strategies to reduce problem behaviours in MPAs and contribute to conservation efforts. Social psychological drivers of behaviour are explained and applied to an MPA context to demonstrate how they can inform strategies for predicting and changing behaviour using persuasive communication. As behavioural and persuasive communication theories are seldom invoked and almost never rigorously applied to MPAs, the review offers new theoretical and practical insights into how they can assist MPA management to target and shift specific behaviours that ultimately support marine park values.     

Ecosystem-based fisheries management in small-scale tropical marine fisheries: Emerging models of governance arrangements in the Philippines

There has been a gradual evolution in fisheries management over the past decades from a focus on sustainability of a single species or stock and resources to a focus on marine ecosystems. Among the issues to be addressed for effective implementation of ecosystem based fisheries management (EBFM) are the appropriate governance arrangements and scale for management. The purpose of this paper is to examine these issues of governance and scale as related to EBFM in tropical developing countries through an analysis of approaches being taken in the Philippines to manage fisheries on a multi-jurisdictional level. The management of fisheries and coastal resources in a number of bays and gulfs, which represent marine ecosystems, is presented. The opportunities and constraints to ecosystem based fisheries management in the Philippines are discussed and lessons for broader application of these governance structures in tropical developing country marine ecosystems are presented.     

Communicating research on the economic valuation of coastal and marine ecosystem services

Quantifying the monetary value of ecosystem services (ES) provided by coastal and marine resources can help policy makers assess the trade-offs and synergies inherent in ecosystem-based management of marine and coastal environments, thus increasing the social efficiency of decision-making processes. As shown by the valuation literature, the number of coastal and marine management settings where valuation researchers have attempted to make a contribution is rising fast. However, this rise in research activity has not been matched by the increase in the use of economic valuation (EV) in the actual management of coastal and marine resources. This raises an interesting question: is EV responding to the needs of policy makers? This paper provides a comprehensive overview of the knowledge base regarding the economic values for coastal and marine ecosystems. It then discusses how to improve the uptake of ES valuation research by focussing on two core issues which are thought to be essential for more effective communication with the policy community.     

Evaluating tradeoffs among ecosystem services to inform marine spatial planning

A central challenge for natural resource management is developing rigorous yet practical approaches for balancing the costs and benefits of diverse human uses of ecosystems. Economic theory has a long history of evaluating tradeoffs in returns from different assets to identify optimal investment strategies. There has been recent progress applying this framework to the delivery of ecosystem services in land use planning. However, despite growing national and international interest in marine spatial planning, there is a lack of parallel frameworks in the marine realm. This paper reviews an ecosystem service tradeoff analysis framework and provides a more comprehensive synthesis for how it can be applied to marine spatial planning and marine ecosystem-based management. A tradeoff analysis approach can reveal inferior management options, demonstrate the benefits of comprehensive planning for multiple, interacting services over managing single services, and identify ‘compatible’ services that provide win–win management options.     

Environmental health indicators

Ecologists have proposed hundreds of quantitative indicators of the status of ecosystems for evaluation of and reporting on the status of marine ecosystems. The talk applies a common approach to classifying indicators, summarises the main properties of each class of indicator, and provides some illustrations.Indicators of ecosystem status have roles in both communication and decision support. For both roles, strengths and weaknesses of indicators are usually only partially known. Few have been tested systematically for sensitivity and robustness across a range of contexts… However, to determine best practices for selecting indicators for specific uses, one must have a fairly complete understanding of the information content of the various indicators. The paper explores some alternative approaches to documenting the information content of various indicators of ecosystem status.As the Precautionary Approach becomes broadly used as the basis for management decision-making, the role of indicators of ecosystem status becomes central. The PA is made operational in decision-making through use of indicators and reference points. This means that it is necessary to identify values of an ecosystem indicator associated with harm to the environment that is serious or difficult to reverse. Methods for identifying and justifying reference points for ecosystem indicators are being developed and tested, but the task is turning out to be complex. Alternative strategies for identifying reference points are reviewed.When choices must be made from a suite of candidate indicators, it is desirable make the selection on objective grounds. This requires explicit a priori criteria, on which there is not yet scientific consensus. Recent developments in this area are reviewed, and again a way forward proposed.     

海洋生态修复研究进展与热点分析

海洋生态修复是遏制海洋生态系统退化的重要途径,受到全球越来越多学者的关注。本研究以科学引文索引(Science Citation Index Expanded,SCIE)数据库为数据源,采用文献计量统计分析方法,结合VOSviewer知识图谱可视化分析软件,定量分析了1980—2019年国际上在海洋生态修复领域发表的相关文献,梳理了近40年来该领域研究的发展脉络、前沿热点和未来方向。结果表明,近40年间,海洋生态修复领域的发文数量随时间呈上升趋势,尤其2000年后增长速度加快,以北美洲、大洋洲、欧洲国家居多,其中美国占绝对领先地位。海洋生态修复领域涉及的学科主要有环境科学、生态学、海洋及淡水生物学等,Journal of Coastal Research、Restoration Ecology、Ecological Engineering和Estuarine,Coastal and Shelf Science是该领域的主要发文期刊。当前海洋生态修复研究热点主要包括植被恢复、海洋生物种群恢复、滨海湿地修复与生物地球化学、气候变化与生态系统管理等主题,其中关于缓解和适应气候变化、生态系统的自然恢复途径、生态系统服务功能提升等方面的研究愈来愈受到关注,是未来一段时间内海洋生态修复领域的研究热点。随着我国《国民经济和社会发展第十四个五年规划》拉开序幕以及海洋生态文明建设不断深化,我国海洋生态修复研究将驶入快车道,建议在应对气候变化的海洋生态修复、区域性海洋生态系统修复规划、海洋生态退化机理与修复关键技术、适应性管理等方面加强研究和探索。     

Catching a wave? A case study on incorporating storm protection benefits into Habitat Equivalency Analysis

Since Hurricane Sandy, there has been heightened attention to increasing the resilience of coastal communities to extreme events, including storm protection provided by coastal ecosystems. Storm protection benefits (SPB) are the ability of ecosystems, including wetlands, reefs, and beaches/dunes, to attenuate waves and storm surge. SPB are a topic of growing interest in the scientific and policy spheres, including discussions of how to incorporate SPB into existing policies. As an engine for restoration and a leading mechanism for the evaluation of ecosystem services, Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA) provides a platform for better internalizing this and other services into decision-making particularly using Habitat Equivalency Analysis (HEA). HEA does not explicitly account for impacts to ecosystem services that flow from one habitat to an adjacent one. This study examines a hypothetical case study of an oil spill that impacts a marsh with resulting impacts on SPB to the adjacent upland forest. To more fully assess these impacts, a “nested HEA” was developed which accounts for cross-habitat ecosystem service flows. The nested HEA captures the impacts of the marsh loss on the forest due to wave and saltwater intrusion that would not be captured by a traditional HEA. By adapting the HEA approach with a nested HEA, NRDA could quantify direct ecosystem services losses as well as additional cross-service flows between habitats. However, additional data are needed in order to perform a nested HEA, and in the case of SPB, location-specific data likely will be needed to appropriately specify the model.     

A global ocean observing system framework for sustainable development

Sustainable development depends on maintaining ecosystem services which are concentrated in coastal marine and estuarine ecosystems. Analyses of the science needed to manage human uses of ecosystem services have concentrated on terrestrial ecosystems. Our focus is on the provision of multidisciplinary data needed to inform adaptive, ecosystem-based approaches (EBAs) for maintaining coastal ecosystem services based on comparative ecosystem analyses. Key indicators of pressures on coastal ecosystems, ecosystem states and the impacts of changes in states on services are identified for monitoring and analysis at a global coastal network of sentinel sites nested in the ocean-climate observing system. Biodiversity is targeted as the “master” indicator because of its importance to a broad spectrum of services. Ultimately, successful implementation of EBAs will depend on establishing integrated, holistic approaches to ocean governance that oversee the development of integrated, operational ocean observing systems based on the data and information requirements specified by a broad spectrum of stakeholders for sustainable development. Sustained engagement of such a spectrum of stakeholders on a global scale is not feasible. The global coastal network will need to be customized locally and regionally based on priorities established by stakeholders in their respective regions. The E.U. Marine Strategy Framework Directive and the U.S. Recommendations of the Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force are important examples of emerging regional scale approaches. The effectiveness of these policies will depend on the co-evolution of ocean policy and the observing system under the auspices of integrated ocean governance.     

A systematic quantitative review of coastal and marine cultural ecosystem services: Current status and future research

Cultural ecosystem services (CES) are the non-material benefits obtained from ecosystems that contribute to human well-being. They are often under-represented in ecosystem services assessments due to difficulties identifying and valuing intangible attributes. This risks a lack of understanding and consideration of CES by decision-makers. A systematic review was done on coastal and marine CES to identify: geographic distribution of research; effective methods for assessing CES; specific habitats/ecosystems that supply CES; subcategories most frequently addressed; and knowledge gaps. Results revealed limited information exists about coastal and marine CES. There is a disparity in the global distribution of studies with little knowledge about CES in developing countries, as well as a disparity within developed countries; with most research undertaken in Europe and North America. There is a dearth of information on CES derived from specific coastal and marine habitats/ecosystems, reflecting a poor understanding of socio-ecological relationships and the different values people assign to these areas. There is a need to develop indicators with the capacity to measure and track changes in CES over time. Participatory approaches using qualitative methods were most effective in identifying CES; however, these lacked a deliberative element that would provide a comprehensive assessment of shared values in public areas. Overall, publications typically theorised about the usefulness of data on CES to inform and support decision makers, and more research is required on how qualitative data on CES can be represented for practical use by coastal and marine resource managers, and the value of these in the real world.     

Do marine protected areas deliver flows of ecosystem services to support human welfare?

This paper examines the potential relationships between the ecosystem services provided by the coastal and marine environment and the designation of marine protected areas. The hypothesis is that relationships exist between the provision of ecosystem services and the features protected by marine protected areas. It is considered that protection will maintain these features in good ecological condition and in some cases will restore ecological functioning with positive effects on the delivery of ecosystem services, as pressures upon the protected features are reduced. As the number of marine protected area designations grows, system-wide effects to communities from improvements in delivery of a range of ecosystem services may be realised. This paper provides a comparative analysis of the jurisdictional marine protected area policies proposed by the English, Welsh and Scottish Governments. It presents structured assessment matrices developed from the literature and expert opinion, of ecosystem service provision by marine protected habitats and species and applies the findings to a range of existing UK marine protected areas to demonstrate its relevance. The approach and case study findings are discussed within the wider context of marine ecosystem services and marine protected area management.     

Using existing scientific capacity to set targets for ecosystem-based management: A Puget Sound case study

Human actions have altered the structure and function of coastal ecosystems worldwide. In many locations, the overall portfolio of goods, cultural amenities, and supporting services provided by the marine environment has deteriorated. Ecosystem-based management (EBM) offers significant promise for addressing these issues because it is a comprehensive and integrated approach designed to reconcile conflicts and trade-offs among users of marine resources. A key step in the implementation of EBM is the establishment of target reference levels, or desired states, for indicators that reflect the status of the ecosystem. This paper reviews five approaches, borrowed from a variety of disciplines, to establish target reference levels for EBM. The approaches include the use of existing reference levels, reference directions, and reference levels based on nonlinear functional relationships, baselines, or social norms. Each approach is particularly suitable for EBM because it can be used alone or in combination with others to contextualize status for a diverse suite of ecosystem goals influenced by a wide variety of human activities. Perhaps most importantly, these approaches offer a prospectus for moving forward with EBM by using readily available information, motivating existing scientific capacity, and addressing trade-offs implicit to the setting of targets. This last point is articulated via examples of how each type of reference level might be applied in Puget Sound, WA, USA, where the efforts of scientists, managers, and policy makers have aligned recently in the interest of EBM implementation.