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Proceedings 2018/021

Proceedings of the Regional Peer Review of an Integrated Ecosystem Assessment Framework for Assessing the Proposed St. Anns Bank Marine Protected Area (MPA), Scotian Shelf; March 29-30, 2016

Chairperson: Tana Worcester

Editor: Kristian Curran

Summary

A Regional Peer Review process was held on March 29-30, 2016, at the Bedford Institute of Oceanography in Nova Scotia, to review a proposed Integrated Ecosystem Assessment (IEA) framework that could be used to monitor the status of Marine Protect Areas (MPAs) and assess the effectiveness of an MPA in meeting its conservation objectives within a regional context. The focus of this meeting was to review the proposed IEA approach, to review the data that have been selected for the application of the approach to the proposed St. Anns Bank MPA, to identify gaps and sources of uncertainty, and to discuss next steps in the development of the approach.

Meeting participants felt that the proposed approach had potential for making effective use of regional synoptic data for providing an overview of ecosystem health (natural variability), which may prove useful context in evaluating the status and effectiveness of MPAs; however, further exploration is required to determine how the results would be integrated into the monitoring plan of an individual MPA, and ultimately used to inform MPA management advice.

It was agreed that the proposed approach should be further explored, and a follow-up meeting was proposed for a later date to review the final results. This Proceedings document is a record of the meeting discussions and conclusions.

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