Making Marine Protected Areas Work: NSYSU Team Reveals the Crucial Next Steps for Global Marine Conservation

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are essential tools for safeguarding marine biodiversity and sustaining ocean resources. However, many of these zones risk becoming "paper parks"—areas that exist in legislation but lack effective management on the ground. To address this global challenge, PhD candidate Shu-Chiang Huang from the International Doctoral Program of Marine Science and Technology (IDPMST) and Professor Yi Chang at National Sun Yat-sen University conducted a comprehensive review to bridge the gap between evaluation and actual conservation implementation.

Main Findings: The Gap Between Evaluation and Action

The research team systematically analyzed 281 peer-reviewed international studies published between 1994 and 2023. Their findings highlight a critical oversight in how marine conservation is assessed and executed:

• Only 22.4% (63 studies) utilized a defined Management Effectiveness Evaluation (MEE) framework to assess performance.
• While many studies involved local stakeholders, 63.5% limited this participation solely to the evaluation phase, primarily through surveys or interviews.
• A mere 12.7% of the evaluated studies documented any follow-up actions that included continued stakeholder participation after the initial assessment.

These numbers reveal a significant disconnect: researchers and managers are evaluating MPAs, but they are rarely translating those findings into participatory, on-the-ground improvements.

Social Impact and Future Solutions

To bridge this implementation gap and generate real social and ecological impact, the study identifies two critical enabling factors for success: sustained stakeholder participation and sustainable financing.

The research emphasizes that MPAs cannot survive on short-term grants or limited government budgets alone. Integrating biodiversity conservation with corporate Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) investments can provide the long-term, diversified funding necessary for operational resilience. Furthermore, actively involving local communities in ongoing decision-making ensures that conservation efforts are widely supported and effectively enforced.

This research, published in the prestigious journal Ocean and Coastal Management, urges a fundamental shift in marine policy. It calls for moving away from merely assessing MPAs toward creating action-oriented frameworks that are inclusive, adaptive, and financially secure.

Full Article:

Bridging the conservation implementation gap in marine protected areas from management assessment to improvement actions

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2025.107838

照片:

圖說：Active collaboration at the field site, demonstrating the critical importance of ‘sustained stakeholder participation’ for moving Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) from evaluation to action.
Pictured from left to right: local fisherman volunteers, PhD candidate Shu-Chiang Huang, Professor Yi Chang, and a local resident volunteer.

圖說：Shu-Chiang Huang carrying out an on-site survey in the waters of Cimei, Penghu.