Towards process-oriented management of tropical reefs in the anthropocene
Seguin, Raphael, Mouillot, David, Cinner, Joshua E., Stuart-Smith, Rick D., Maire, Eva, Graham, Nicholas A.J., McLean, Matthew, Vigliola, Laurent, and Loiseau, Nicolas (2023) Towards process-oriented management of tropical reefs in the anthropocene. Nature Sustainability, 6. pp. 148-157.
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Abstract
Tropical reefs and the fish relying on them are under increasing pressure. Shallow-reef fish provide important ecological information in addition to sustaining fisheries, tourism and more. Although empirical metrics of fish biomass are widely used in fisheries management, metrics of biomass production-how much new biomass is produced over time-are rarely estimated even though such production informs potential fisheries yields. Here we estimate fish standing biomass (B), biomass production (P, the rate of biomass accumulation) and biomass turnover (P/B ratio, the rate of biomass replacement) for 1,979 tropical reef sites spanning 39 tropical countries. On the basis of fish standing biomass and biomass turnover, we propose a conceptual framework that splits reefs into three classes to visualize ecological and socio-economic risk and help guide spatial management interventions (for example, marine protected areas) to optimize returns on conservation efforts. At large scales, high turnover was associated with high human pressure and low primary productivity, whereas high biomass was associated with low human pressure and high primary productivity. Going beyond standing fish biomass to consider dynamic ecological processes can better guide regional coral reef conservation and sustainable fisheries management. Sustaining tropical reefs in the Anthropocene is a vital challenge. This study proposes guiding regional conservation on the basis of ecological processes and finds that the biomass and productivity of reef fish provide complementary information for management.
| Item ID: | 76885 |
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| Item Type: | Article (Research - C1) |
| ISSN: | 2398-9629 |
| Copyright Information: | This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
| Date Deposited: | 30 Nov 2022 07:39 |
| FoR Codes: | 44 HUMAN SOCIETY > 4406 Human geography > 440604 Environmental geography @ 10% 30 AGRICULTURAL, VETERINARY AND FOOD SCIENCES > 3005 Fisheries sciences > 300505 Fisheries management @ 90% |
| SEO Codes: | 18 ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT > 1805 Marine systems and management > 180501 Assessment and management of benthic marine ecosystems @ 100% |
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