Burdens of evidence and the benefits of marine reserves: putting Descartes before des horse?

Author:

Willis T.J.,Millar R.B.,Babcock R.C.,Tolimieri N.

Abstract

An extensive literature has appeared since 1990 on the study of ‘no-take’ marine reserves and their potential to make significant contributions to the conservation and management of fisheries, especially in tropical environments (see Polunin 1990; Roberts & Polunin 1991; DeMartini 1993; Roberts 1997; Allison et al. 1998; Guénette et al. 1998). The literature describes many potential benefits of marine reserves to fisheries, including increases in spawner-biomass-per-recruit and increases in larval supply from protecting ‘source’ populations (Jennings 2000). The important word here is ‘potential’. Some claims made by advocates of marine reserves might be regarded as optimistic, whereas critics of reserves might sometimes have been unduly harsh. Conservation goals for marine reserves are often poorly defined, and differences of opinion regarding the efficacy of reserves for fulfilling any of their stated goals can frequently be attributed to a lack of good information with which to predict their effects. Here, we critically examine the literature from 1990–2001 to determine (1) the relative effort put into empirical and theoretical approaches to predict reserve effects, and (2) the quality of empirical evidence available to support theoretical predictions. It is not the purpose of this article to single out particular studies for criticism (although this is sometimes inevitable to provide examples), nor to draw conclusions concerning the efficacy of marine reserves.

Publisher

Cambridge University Press (CUP)

Subject

Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis,Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law,Nature and Landscape Conservation,Pollution,Water Science and Technology

同舟云学术

1.学者识别学者识别

2.学术分析学术分析

3.人才评估人才评估

"同舟云学术"是以全球学者为主线,采集、加工和组织学术论文而形成的新型学术文献查询和分析系统,可以对全球学者进行文献检索和人才价值评估。用户可以通过关注某些学科领域的顶尖人物而持续追踪该领域的学科进展和研究前沿。经过近期的数据扩容,当前同舟云学术共收录了国内外主流学术期刊6万余种,收集的期刊论文及会议论文总量共计约1.5亿篇,并以每天添加12000余篇中外论文的速度递增。我们也可以为用户提供个性化、定制化的学者数据。欢迎来电咨询!咨询电话:010-8811{复制后删除}0370

www.globalauthorid.com

TOP

Copyright © 2019-2024 北京同舟云网络信息技术有限公司
京公网安备11010802033243号  京ICP备18003416号-3