World Economic Forum - OpEd
March 11, 2021
Most MPAs seek to protect critical ocean habitats and species from one or more existential or predicted threats. The vast majority of such threats, such as pollution and exploitation of nature, are human induced. For an MPA to function effectively there must be science-based monitoring of progress, management of human activities and the environment, surveillance, and enforcement of rules and regulations put into place to abate the threat and protect species and ecosystems.
To do this at scale requires significant effort. Achieving 30 percent protection and conservation of the whole ocean—both coastal and high seas—requires that we protect and conserve 109 million square kilometres (42 million square miles), an area more than 11 times the size of the entire United States.