Protecting Marine Ecosystems NAMPAN CEC Council Session26 June 2008

Where are we coming from A growing portion of North America’s population lives on or near its coasts, thereby placing various pressures on its coastal and marine ecosystems Trends in North America show significant progress in the management of the ocean environment but long-term challenges remain for sustainable fisheries, protection of coastal waters and beaches, and conservation of marine biodiversity Throughout North America, marine protected areas (MPAs) have been established to conserve natural heritage, cultural heritage and to protect the long-term sustainability of our shared marine resources Those same human connections to nature also link people to each other, regardless of nationality. The peoples of North America share ocean resources and concerns about ocean health. Our diverse cultures find common ground in the sea. Protecting special places in the sea is an important way our cultures take responsibility for ensuring the health of our oceans. North Americans protect ocean resources in many special places, collectively called Marine Protected Areas (MPAs).

NAMPAN accomplishments Established a functional network of managers of MPAs throughout Baja California to the Bering Sea aimed at protecting shared species and spaces  Developed a continental classification of marine ecological regions that improves our knowledge base of marine ecosystems  Identified a list of 28 Marine Priority Conservation Areas (PCAs) along the west coast of North America Developed a region-wide system to assess and report on the ecological conditions of marine protected areas along the Pacific Coast of North America Point 3: The B2B Priority Conservation Areas guided the establishment of 4 MPAs in Mexico (Isla Espíritu Santo, Isla Guadalupe, Bahía de los Angeles and Islas Marias)  Point 4: the system allows individual MPA sites to prepare “ecological scorecards” based on a consistent framework that has been developed by NAMPAN, and which has built on the System-wide Monitoring Program associated with Marine Sanctuaries in the United States.

NAMPAN Strategy Marine priority conservation areas Focus on special places already protected through existing domestic regulations Provide continent-wide ecological context Marine ecoregions Marine priority conservation areas Use existing information to assess MPA health Demonstrate value of evidence and science-based assessments The CEC conducted a pilot project to distill large amounts of complex technical and traditional ecological knowledge about MPA conditions into a common understanding for a few selected MPAs in the Bering Sea to Baja California (B2B) portion of NAMPAN. The goal of this pilot project was to explore a scorecarding method established by the NAMPAN and to use the result of this exploration to develop a tool to improve science and evidence-based ocean stewardship, increase civic engagement in MPA management, and increase understanding of ecosystem health. This assessment tool, when applied broadly, could further improve regional and continental scale conservation strategies and support systematic environmental monitoring. Only with the knowledge gained from such monitoring can local communities begin to improve ocean conditions proactively by treating the underlying causes of strain, and move beyond reactively treating only the symptoms of environmental stresses.

Baja to Bering (B2B) Pilot Project Ten MPAs Expert panels Standard questions Water Habitat Living Resources Condition & Trend Consensus judgments on MPA health For the pilot project, the CEC selected ten MPAs in the B2B region representing a diverse array of biogeographical settings. Two MPAs represented the Columbian Pacific ecoregion, with one in the Montereyan Pacific Transition, three in the Southern Californian Pacific, and three in the Gulf of California ecoregion (Table 1). These ten MPAs also ranged widely in size, complexity, and environmental setting. The smallest pilot MPA occupies 220 ha that includes an area of seabed and a group of small islands and reefs. The largest pilot MPA includes coastal lagoons, beaches, nursery grounds for the gray whale and open ocean habitats in over two and a half million hectares. This diversity assured that the findings would be robust and reflect the range of conditions found throughout NAMPAN. As a basis for the pilot, the CEC developed a series of 14 standard questions about MPA water, habitat, living resources, and human activities to describe environmental health (Table 2). For each question, the CEC also developed a standard scoring grid related to both conditions and trends. Conditions for each ecosystem element addressed by the questions were defined on a five-point scale, ranging from superior (best it could be) to critical (worst it could be). Trends in conditions were likewise defined in five categories ranging from rapidly improving to rapidly diminishing (likely to reach a different state in five years) and stable (unlikely to change beyond normal variation) (Table 3). The CEC convened groups of 10-25 experts on each pilot MPA to consider the 14 standard questions, to present and receive evidence of conditions and trends and, based on available evidence, to render professional judgments and consensus opinions regarding environmental health of the MPA. Managers of the MPAs identified prospective experts, who were invited to attend a workshop for discussion and consensus decisions. Expert groups included conservation managers, scientists, community officials, and selected members of sectors of society with intimate contact and extensive experience with the MPA.

Future Challenges Establish standard NAMPAN scorecard protocol Expand the process to other MPAs within and beyond the B2B region for a continental perspective Compare MPAs with other sites: Ocean observing systems Integrate information from non-MPA sources (e.g., fisheries, ocean observing systems) Plan for long-term implementation Monitoring project has demonstrated that NAMPAN is fostering trinational progress toward an effective North American Network of MPAs and should be drawn on to advance work on other shared MPA challenges A protocol that describes how to conduct a NAMPAN scorecard workshop and how to prepare a scorecard is needed to standardize the process. NAMPAN is currently developing a scorecarding handbook, and considering how to deliver and support the protocol in a variety of formats, from interactive web-based programs to more traditional printed formats. Lessons learned in the pilot will help to improve consistency of evidence collected at workshops, to define and document confidence in addressing uncertainty of information, to increase clarity of the standard questions, and to define baselines for evaluating conditions and change. The scorecards and the process that produces them will help develop support for more systematic, focused, and sustained MPA monitoring. This scorecard process can also help harmonize regional and continental MPA stewardship based on science and evidence that supports local initiatives for monitoring. The pilot project shows that scorecards possess considerable promise as a tool to improve science- and evidence-based ocean stewardship, to increase civic engagement in ocean conservation, and to advance understanding of ecosystem health. When expanded NAMPAN-wide, these scorecards have the capacity to help build a community of practitioners, to encourage shared monitoring of common ocean health indicators, and to improve understanding of ocean ecosystems, biodiversity, and human interactions with nature.