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INTEGRATED COASTAL ZONE AND FISHERIES ECOSYSTEM MANAGEMENT: GENERIC GOALS AND PERFORMANCE INDICES
Author(s) -
Done T. J.,
Reichelt R. E.
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
ecological applications
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.864
H-Index - 213
eISSN - 1939-5582
pISSN - 1051-0761
DOI - 10.1890/1051-0761(1998)8[s110:iczafe]2.0.co;2
Subject(s) - ecosystem , environmental resource management , biodiversity , trophic level , ecosystem based management , fisheries management , ecosystem health , habitat , ecosystem services , marine protected area , representativeness heuristic , marine ecosystem , ecology , fisheries science , ecosystem management , fishery , environmental science , fishing , biology , psychology , social psychology
Integrated Coastal Zone Management activities such as catchment rehabilitation and marine protected areas are legitimate components of fisheries management. Their goal is to improve the environment and circumstances for the production of reproductive surplus in fisheries through maintaining habitats, ecosystem processes, and biodiversity. However, while concepts of ecosystem processes and biodiversity are laudable, they provide little if any guidance for management actions meant to sustain them. Difficulties in implementation are partly due to lack of information, understanding, and communication of ecosystem concepts among scientists, managers, and fishers. Here, we describe indices whose function is to report progress towards desired ecosystem outcomes recognizable to society at large. One such outcome is the extent to which management reverses shifts from long‐lived to short‐lived organisms, from mature to immature individuals, and from higher to lower trophic levels. Several generic indices incorporating this and other elements of habitat protection embracing ecological concepts of “representativeness,” “successional stage,” “alternate states,” and “conservation status” are proposed for marine protected area selection and for monitoring trends in the large marine ecosystems of which fisheries are a part. Specific and realistic goals would need to be defined by fishers and other stakeholders in particular coastal areas.