Marine Conservation - Science topic

Submit to: https://www.mdpi.com/topics/6N95F78A4B . Chemical pollutants, heavy metals, and macro- and microplastics are continuously discharged from the mainland into the sea and are bio-accumulated and bio-magnified by marine organisms, with negative consequences on the whole trophic web, at all ecosystem levels. Manmade underwater noises create d...

Marine microorganisms are central to global ecological and biogeochemical systems, with their intricate interactions shaping community dynamics. While meta-omics data sets have revolutionized marine microbial ecology, they often provide fragmented insights, underscoring the need for advanced integrative modeling frameworks. In this review, we highl...

This study investigates the diversity of barnacles along the eastern coastal margin of Bangladesh, focusing on the Cox's Bazar Sea and St. Martin Island regions. The main goal is to improve our understanding of barnacle distribution in these areas, emphasizing species composition, morphological abnormalities and geographic patterns. In addition to...

Threats to ocean health are not distributed equally among nations: low-and middle-income countries (LMICs) are disproportionately impacted by conservation threats, which are frequently driven by high-income countries (HICs). These inequities and resultant challenges have been driven by a long history of colonialism and resource exploitation by HICs...

This study aims to identify the potential of marine tourism and design an event concept that can enhance the welfare of the local community in Mallasoro Village, Jeneponto Regency, South Sulawesi. Using a qualitative approach with descriptive methods, data was collected through in-depth interviews, observations, and documentation. SWOT analysis (St...

Seagrasses are critical marine ecosystems facing numerous threats in the Philippines. This study aimed to develop a robust methodology for nationwide seagrass mapping using open-access satellite imagery and empower students to contribute through remote sensing education. We achieved this through a two-pronged approach: (1) developing a satellite-ba...

Transferability of species distribution models (SDMs) is vital for guiding biological conversation in the changing marine ecosystems, whereas most SDMs have remained insufficiently tested in terms of transferences. Particularly, the roles of biotic interactions in shaping ecological niches had less been considered when predictive models are transfe...

Against a backdrop of international commitment to establish effective marine protected area networks, UK marine policy is increasingly ambitious in its scope to designate a higher quantity and quality of marine protected areas. This ambition is not without challenge and controversy in an island nation with multiple competing demands spanning shippi...

The Dampier Strait regional conservation area is one of the conservation areas included in the Raja Ampat Regency marine conservation area, which has high potential for developing tourism activities. The most important aspect in the use of natural resources for tourism purposes is their suitability to support tourism activities. The challenge faced...

This study evaluates waste management strategies on Buluh Island to enhance marine ecosystem protection and ensure tourism sustainability. The research highlights a significant relationship between waste accumulation and the degradation of marine ecosystems, which threatens both the environment and the island’s tourism sector. Utilizing qualitative...

The blue economy paradigm promotes sustainable economic growth by linking social equality, poverty reduction and marine conservation. Bintan Island, a designated Special Economic Zone (SEZ), has faced a challenge in accommodating economic growth and social equality for indigenous people living in coastal settlements. Providing settlement permits an...

This presentation is about two main drivers of biodiversity changes in the Mediterranean Sea: climate change and biological invasions. The Mediterranean Sea is a global hotspot for both climate change and biological invasions, which have caused substantial changes in distribution patterns and species composition, with local extinctions or declines...

Population surges of crown‐of‐thorns starfish (COTS) (Acanthaster spp.) are a leading cause of coral cover loss on Australia's Great Barrier Reef (GBR). While COTS culling has been undertaken since 2012 little is known about how the public perceive COTS culling or how perceptions vary among social groups. Drawing on survey data collected in 2018 an...

Leatherback turtles Dermochelys coriacea are globally endangered. This study tracked 30 individuals from the North Atlantic population tagged on the Caribbean Panama rookery (San San Pond Sak protected area, Bocas del Toro) over a period of 3 yr. We used satellite telemetry to investigate the probability that turtles switched between migration and...

plastic waste management is burning issue in the country.

The South Caribbean Island of Curaçao is abundant in coral reef communities, but they are declining. Land-derived nutrients and pollutants are a potential contributing factor to this decline, as these substances after entering the ocean, can be transported towards reef sites by ocean currents. To study the movement of the substances and their poten...

Our study of periodic octopus closures helps to fill an empirical gap in community-based marine protected area (MPA) research on socially-diverse multidimensional wellbeing impacts. Human wellbeing provides a more meaningful and holistic measure of social impacts than previous economic measures while recognising equity- evidence that ultimately ens...

Social developments are bringing about changes in how we communicate and represent ideas. With the tendency of globalisation, marine ecosystems are facing threats such as overfishing, pollution, and climate change, and marine ecological protection has become a focus of attention for all countries. This paper adopts Kress and van Leeuwen’s framework...

Marine protected areas (MPAs) are critical in safeguarding biodiversity and ecosystem functions under climate change. The long-term effectiveness of these static conservation measures will depend on how well they represent current and future ocean changes. Here, we use the Climate Risk Index for Biodiversity to assess the vulnerability representati...

This research discusses the global marine and fisheries digital repositories via library software, education open access resources and publications with its geographical location. It demonstrates the importance of these repositories for facilitating marine and fisheries science, granting access to crucial information underpinning global research an...

Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated (IUU) fishing poses significant threats to marine ecosystems and sustainable fisheries management worldwide. As one of the world's leading fishing nations, Taiwan faces challenges addressing IUU fishing and its environmental impacts. Especially after the EU's yellow card warning was lifted. This research aims to...

The use of environmental DNA (eDNA) to assess the presence of biological communities has emerged as a promising monitoring tool in the marine conservation landscape. Moreover, advances in Next-Generation Sequencing techniques, such as DNA metabarcoding, enable multi-species detection in mixed samples, allowing the study of complex ecosystems such a...

Marine mammals are integral to global biodiversity and marine health through their roles in coastal, benthic, and pelagic ecosystems. Marine mammals face escalating threats from climate change, pollution, and human activities, which perturb their oceanic environment. The diverse biology and extreme adaptations evolved by marine mammals make them im...

Other effective area-based conservation measures (OECMs) represent a new frontier in conservation, aiming to acknowledge efforts that contribute to biodiversity beyond marine protected areas (MPAs). Many nations, including Indonesia, are establishing country-specific criteria to define what qualifies as an OECM. However, demonstrating the biodivers...

The NANO-DOAP project is a global initiative started in 2017 to study coastal deoxygenation, ocean acidification, and productivity at various sites worldwide. It includes 36 study sites across 18 countries, spanning a broad geographic range. Some locations have multiple monitoring stations, allowing for detailed data collection. The project, coordi...

The amount of ocean protected from fishing and other human impacts has often been used as a metric of conservation progress. However, protection efforts have highly variable outcomes that depend on local conditions, which makes it difficult to quantify what coral reef protection efforts to date have actually achieved at a global scale. Here, we dev...

Fisheries are recognized as important in Mozambique, yet they are increasingly threatened by over-exploitation and climate change. We collate and synthesize the available literature and data on marine fisheries in Mozambique; assess the status of the main fishery species/stocks; give an overview of current management of the fishery, and discuss pla...

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are a cornerstone of marine conservation efforts, with the potential to protect biodiversity and provide socioeconomic benefits. We quantified the effect of MPAs on fishing outcomes, economic activities, and material living standards in 24 coastal villages of Tanzania over two decades. We accessed original data from a...

Objectives: Marine biodiversity and ecosystem services in the high seas are threatened by numerous stress factors caused by human activities, including global shipping, high-sea fishing, marine plastic pollution, and anthropogenic climate change. Socioeconomic factors are one of the criteria for the establishment of area-based management tools in t...

Other Effective Conservation Measures (OECMs) recognize that various forms of management actions can contribute to biodiversity conservation. OECMs have been criticized for ambiguity, lack of criteria for evaluation and, thereby, inconsistent implementation. Nevertheless, many coastal states aim to evaluate current management actions as candidates...

The BirdLife Seabird Tracking Database (STDB) was established in 2004 to collate tracking data to address the incidental mortality of seabirds in fisheries and to contribute to identification of sites at sea relevant to establishment of Marine Protected Areas. After 20 years, the STDB has grown to hold ca. 39 million locations for 168 species from...

The Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) - including Canada - approved the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KMGBF) Decision 15/4 2022), which builds on earlier commitments to achieve 30% protection of Canada’s ocean by 2030 by increasing spatial conservation of biodiversity using marine protected areas (MPAs) and O...

Wini Afiati's children's novel The Mystery of the Disappearance of the Turtle on Venu Island tells the story of a family who has just moved to the town of Kaiman, West Papua. The area is close to Venu Island. Venu Island is where the father character works as a marine conservation supervisor. However, there is an unexpected phenomenon, turtles that...

The success of marine environmental regulations in terms of social challenges in Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) countries is the main subject of this study, which compares and contrasts them with an eye toward sustainability, the integration of digital technologies, environmental law, and reducing ecological degradation. Environmental solid governa...

Rhodolith beds are diverse and globally distributed habitats. Nonetheless, the role of rhodoliths in structuring the associated species community through a hierarchy of positive interactions is yet to be recognised. In this review, we provide evidence that rhodoliths can function as foundation species of multi-level facilitation cascades and, hence...

To fulfill their conservation potential and provide safeguards for biodiversity, marine protected areas (MPAs) need coordinated research and monitoring for informed management through effective evaluation of ecosystem dynamics. However, coordination is challenging, often due to knowledge gaps caused by inadequate access to data and resources, compo...

In an era of ongoing biodiversity, it is critical to map biodiversity patterns in space and time for better‐informing conservation and management. Species distribution models (SDMs) are widely applied in various types of such biodiversity assessments. Cross‐validation represents a prevalent approach to assess the discrimination capacity of a target...

The accumulation of sea-surface debris around the coastal waters of Malta poses significant ecological and environmental challenges, negatively affecting marine ecosystems and human activities. This issue is exacerbated due to the lack of an effective system tailored to predict surface-debris movement specifically for the Islands of Malta. To addre...

Biodiversity changes and habitat shifts are two phenomena substantially reshaping marine life on our present and future planet. Although those phenomena are well recognized on the macrobial level, they currently do not receive similar attention on the microbial level. Generally, microbiome diversity and function, associated with and governing the h...

Species are responding to global changes through widespread redistribution, with documented shifts across latitudes, elevations, and depths. While redistributions are widespread, the link between the attempts of species to follow their preferred conditions and climate and their chances of successfully persisting has been rarely examined empirically...

Whale sound is a typical transient signal. The escalating demands of ecological research and marine conservation necessitate advanced technologies for the automatic detection and classification of underwater acoustic signals. Traditional energy detection methods, which focus primarily on amplitude, often perform poorly in the non-Gaussian noise con...

The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) underscores the role of ecological connectivity in delivering societal goals, but the proposed indicators for connectivity originate in terrestrial systems and have not been tested in the ocean. We assess the applicability of the indicators to marine systems and present existing approaches of...

Global literature highlights risks in the seafood trade and suggests mitigation methods, but these issues are often overlooked in developing countries, particularly in Pakistan, due to ineffective policy implementation. This underlines the urgent need for a thorough investigation into Pakistan’s seafood trade to address its multifaceted risks and r...

Fish spawning aggregations are vulnerable to overexploitation, which can have severe ecological, social, and economic consequences. Knowledge on the spatial ecology of aggregating species is often lacking, but is crucial for their effective conservation. This study explores the spawning site residency, interannual fidelity, and migration of black s...

This study aimed to develop a comprehensive framework for sustainable project management in marine conservation projects along Kenya's coast. Employing a mixed-methods approach, the research combined quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews with 60 stakeholders from Mombasa, Kilifi, and Lamu. The study revealed that while marine conservation...

Seabirds are among the most threatened avian taxa. Effective seabird conservation requires an understanding of both seabird distributions and habitat usage. Species distribution models can help identify important areas for protection and manage threats to seabird populations. However, populations of the same species may differ in their response to...

Understanding and preserving the deep sea ecosystems is paramount for marine conservation efforts. Automated object (deep-sea biota) classification can enable the creation of detailed habitat maps that not only aid in biodiversity assessments but also provide essential data to evaluate ecosystem health and resilience. Having a significant source of...

Climate change is increasingly affecting the world's ocean ecosystems, necessitating urgent guidance on adaptation strategies to limit or prevent catastrophic impacts. The Fisheries and Marine Ecosystem Model Intercomparison Project (FishMIP) is a network and framework that provides standardised ensemble projections of the impacts of climate change...

While extinction risk categorization is fundamental for building robust conservation planning for marine fishes, empirical data on occurrence and vulnerability to disturbances are still lacking for most marine teleost fish species, preventing the assessment of their International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) status. In this article,...

Nature‐based tourism has a unique opportunity, and arguably responsibility, to promote widespread action on climate change. However, research suggests an aversion to providing information that might appear divisive or ‘ruin’ peoples day, particularly in places that are vulnerable to degradation. We explore how exposure to climate change information...

This study addresses the challenge of advancing habitat use knowledge of widely distributed marine species populations when regional data is scarce. To achieve this, we use an innovative approach based on ecological niche models (ENMs) calibrated with global presence data to estimate the global niche of species, allowing for indirect predictions of...

Biodiversity is critical for maintaining ecosystem function but is threatened by increasing anthropogenic pressures. In the Southern Ocean, a highly biologically productive region containing many endemic species, proactive management is urgently needed to mitigate increasing pressures from fishing, climate change, and tourism. Site‐based conservati...

Marine protected areas (MPAs) are widely promoted as effective tools for conserving biodiversity and safeguarding ecosystem services. However, MPA success can be hindered by a lack of legitimacy and low social support because of perceived negative effects on ecosystem services and human well-being. Despite these social challenges, the social dimens...

This research examines the role of environmental protection expenditure (EPE) in advancing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) within seven Asian countries: China, Indonesia, Israel, South Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand. Focusing on SDG 6 (Clean Water and Sanitation), SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), SDG 12 (Respons...

A restorative economy is a melding of environmental restoration and business activities, with interactions and feedbacks that contribute positively to society through enhancing multiple social, cultural, environmental, and financial well-beings. Ecosystem services, which can be used to document and quantify the benefits of healthy functioning ecosy...

Context Seascape connectivity refers to how the spatial configuration of marine habitats facilitates or hinders the movement of organisms, nutrients, materials or energy. Predicting and ranking potential connectivity among habitat patches for coral reef fishes helps to understand how reef fishes could utilize and connect multiple habitat types thro...

The Blue Economy represents a sustainable development model emphasizing the responsible use of ocean resources to foster economic growth while preserving marine ecosystems. This approach aims to balance economic prosperity with environmental conservation, recognizing the oceans' crucial role in supporting life on Earth. Key sectors within the Blue...

Elasmobranchs (sharks and rays) can be important components of marine ecosystems but are experiencing global population declines. Effective monitoring of these populations is essential to their protection. Baited Remote Underwater Video Stations (BRUVS) have been a key tool for monitoring, but require time-consuming manual analysis. To address thes...

Kedindingan Island is a part of marine conservation area in East Kalimantan. This island has a seagrass ecosystem, which could potentially provide ecosystem service in climate change mitigation as a carbon sink. However, there is limited information on the carbon content of the seagrass ecosystem there. This study aimed to estimate the carbon stock...

This investigation presents pioneering discoveries concerning the endemic seaweed Ulva ovata across multiple sites in the Gulf of Khambhat, India, going beyond its type locality, Gopnath. The primary objective of this research was to examine the substrate type and various environmental factors affecting seaweed diversity at five sites where endemic...

This study aimed to investigate the carbon content in mangrove sediments within the North Minahasa District Marine Conservation Area and to understand the factors affecting organic carbon dynamics. It is revealed that the carbon content is significantly varied. Carbon content ranged from 13.874 to 132.65 Mg C ha-1 across different sampling location...

Ambitious European Union (EU) policies are aiming to halt and reverse marine biodiversity loss in the current decade. However, EU environmental and conservation policies have so far fallen short of their targets. This study explores how the key actors in policy interpretation and implementation frame their understandings of these policy objectives,...

Coral reefs worldwide are under increasing levels of pressure due to global and local stressors. Long-term monitoring of coral reefs through repeated observations at fixed survey sites allows scientists to assess temporal patterns in coral-reef communities and plays important roles in informing managers of the state of the ecosystems. Here, we desc...