Failures in the design and implementation of management plans of Marine Protected Areas: An empirical analysis for the North-east Atlantic Ocean

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The characteristics and duration of the processes occurring from the design and designation of a Marine Protected Area (MPA) to the effective implementation and renewal of its management plan were analysed in 234 MPAs from four countries in the North-east Atlantic Ocean (France, Portugal, Spain and England). These MPAs were managed by 118 plans and each one could be applied to between one and 11 MPAs, with a mean of 2 MPAs per plan. Of these plans, 81% had been implemented since 2000, motivated by the approval of different directives at the European and global levels that promoted important changes in national policies. Information about the design and implementation of each management plan was summarized through a questionnaire, and was analysed to describe the different phases of the design and implementation and determine the duration of each phase. Four main failures were identified in the design and implementation of plans: (i) Gaps between MPA designation and plan implementation, with a mean period of 10.9 years; (ii) only 70% of the analysed MPAs shared a plan; (iii) stakeholders were involved only in the revision phase of the plan design in 90% of the cases, while their involvement in the other critical design processes occurred in less than 30% of the cases; (iv) 39% of operating plans were not renewed on time and had a delay of 4 years on average, extending the duration of plans up to almost twice their planned 5- to 6-year duration. These failures represent clear shortcomings in MPA performance, because: (i) during the gap period the MPAs were “paper parks”; (ii) sharing a plan among MPAs does not allow to define specific objectives for every MPA involved; (iii) actively involving stakeholders in all phases from the development of the plan to its daily management is an important point for the long-term success of a plan; and (iv) plan renewal is an essential process to ensure the continuous improvement and innovation in management required for the good performance of a MPA.