Home

Monitoring of marine protected areas (MPAs) is critical for marine ecosystem management, yet current protocols rely on SCUBA-based visual surveys that are costly and time consuming, limiting their scope and effectiveness. Environmental DNA (eDNA) metabarcoding is a promising alternative for marine ecosystem monitoring, but more direct comparisons to visual surveys are needed to understand the strengths and limitations of each approach.

The objective of this project is to formalize the experiences,
outcomes and lessons learned from previous GEF projects,
as well as major non-GEF initiatives involving coral reefs and
associated ecosystems. The project aims to comprehensively
identify, analyze, and translate lessons into good practices
and information resources, and then disseminate this
information globally for use in future project design and
development. Based on its history of supporting coral reef
biodiversity, management and sustainable development,

The world’s more than 200 000 protected areas come
in many forms, on land and at sea, and occur in every
country (Bertzky et al. 2012). They are places that people
establish to conserve natural and cultural heritage and
to sustain their benefits for society. Among other values,
protected areas allow people to connect with nature for
their inspiration, education, well-being and recreation.
While protecting ecosystems that are essential for life,
they can support human livelihoods and aspirations
and offer nature-based solutions for the complex

This book has been prepared as a contribution to the IUCN World Parks Congress in Sydney in 2014. The global community is at the interface of ensuring the quality of protected area governance and management, together with the way that effectively managed and

Hunting is a major driver of biodiversity loss, but a systematic large-scale estimate of hunting-induced defaunation is lacking. We synthesized 176 studies to quantify huntinginduced declines of mammal and bird populations across the tropics. Bird and mammal abundances declined by 58% (25 – 76 %) and by 83% (72 – 90%) in hunted compared to unhunted areas. Bird and mammal populations were depleted within 7 and 40 km from hunters’ access points (roads and settlements). Additionally, hunting pressure was higher in areas with better accessibility to major towns where wild meat could be traded.

Research on the coral-eating crown-of-thorns starfish (CoTS) has waxed and waned over the last few decades, mostly in response to population outbreaks at specific locations. This review considers advances in our understanding of the biology and ecology of CoTS based on the resurgence of research interest, which culminated in this current special issue on the Biology, Ecology and Management of Crown-of-Thorns Starfish. More specifically, this review considers progress in addressing 41 specific research questions posed in a seminal review by P.