Marine protected areas and human well-being – A systematic review and recommendations

This paper reviews literature relating to Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) and human well-being. It finds that explicit studies on human well-being from MPAs are limited and empirical studies quantifying these relationships are rare. Most MPA papers, including those examining MPA effectiveness, focus on just a few aspects of well-being in the context of a sub-set of stakeholders, and consider only a single type of MPA. They mostly focus on conventional objective measures that are not comprehensive or systematically selected. This review argues for a systematic and integrative framework to ensure future MPA assessments are equipped to capture MPAs’ contributions to human well-being more adequately and comprehensively. Such a framework can also allow for cross-MPA comparisons that can capture differences in well-being across different types of MPAs, and information gained can be useful for MPA practitioners and policy makers, particularly in reaching current global targets, such as the CBD, Aichi Target 11.