Marine protected areas and pelagic fishing: the case of the Chagos Archipelago.

Most marine protected areas are only partially protected in that they commonly permit fishing, a primary ecosystem-distorting activity. Many indeed are no more than ‘paper parks’. The creation of no-take MPAs lags well behind several national declarations of intent and certainly lags behind need. A letter calling for more of these no-take zones has been signed by 250 of the world’s leading scientists (http://www.globaloceanlegacy.org/). Although the poor situation in the oceans is slowly changing, it is not without opposition from the pelagic fishing industry. A two day workshop was held earlier this year in connection with pelagic fisheries and the creation of the Chagos Marine Protected Area. This half a million square kilometres sits in the middle of the Indian Ocean where, amongst other things, pelagic fisheries will be prohibited from late 2010. It is a roughly circular zone about 450 nautical miles in diameter. Detailed aspects of this are in this issue Koldewey et al. (2010). Chagos has a marvellously rich set of coral reefs, which was the motive driving the MPA creation by the UK government in the first place, but it is also is a region where tuna fisheries once operated. The Chagos MPA will double the no-take pelagic area in the oceans, but how significant is this, both in quantitative terms and in terms of the change in attitude towards the pelagic fishing industry by placing such restrictions upon it? The case for protection has long been clear for marine species with low mobility, such as reef sharks and coral reef fishes that would clearly benefit from zero fishing mortality throughout their home range throughout their annual cycle. But the most contentious question occupied the most time – that of closure also to tuna fisheries. The workshop was not very important for any formal conclusion which, apart from those unanimous and inevitable calls for more research etc., was irreconcilably divided between the tuna fishers that were present and environmental scientists. But it was illuminating for views gleaned during informal conversations between sessions. Those of us who have advocated no-take MPAs were castigated by the industry on several issues. Firstly, we were lectured, the area is too small to make any difference to the oceanic tuna fishery (so we should not bother to make it a no-take zone). Others said the area was so big it will adversely affect the tuna industry (so we should not make it a no-take zone). The tone of the language used privately was sometimes arrogant and aggressive, reflecting perhaps the presumed ownership that fisheries have exerted over the oceans. This ownership has been largely unchallenged until recently, but now some governments are beginning to designate large MPAs and, finally, to apply no-take status to pelagic fisheries. Chagos is thus a test case in this sense. Some fisheries proponents claimed that the data are so poor for Indian Ocean tuna that there was no science to back up a closure. So, of course, it shouldn’t be closed. Another claimed the data from this part of the Ocean