Scientific findings don’t always translate neatly into actions, especially in conservation and resource management. The disconnect can leave academics and practitioners disheartened and a bit frustrated.
“We want conservation science to be informing real-world needs,” said Darcy Bradley, a senior ocean scientist at The Nature Conservancy and a former director of UC Santa Barbara’s Environmental Markets Lab.
“Most managers and practitioners also want to incorporate science into their work,” added Cori Lopazanski, a doctoral student at UCSB’s Bren School of Environmental Science & Management.
Lopazanski and Bradley were particularly curious how much science was finding its way into the management plans of marine protected areas, or MPAs. These are areas of the ocean set aside for conservation of biodiversity, cultural heritage and natural resources. The pair led a study investigating the management plans for 555 marine protected areas to clarify how the documents incorporated recommendations for climate resilience. The team found that many plans contain forward-looking strategies, even when they didn’t explicitly reference “climate change” or related terms. The heartening results appear in the journal Conservation Letters.
Read more at University of California - Santa Barbara
Photo Credit: daren_ck via Wikimedia Commons
