Saving our seas:Are Marine Protected Areas effective in protecting sea life?

摘要

The UK and EU are creating more and more Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) as they rush to meet a UN goal of protecting 30% of the world's oceans by 2030. Conservationists, however, argue that most MPAs actually provide little or no protection against human activity. So, are MPAs fit for purpose? Should they be reformed or replaced now that the UK is officially out of the Common Fisheries Policy?Water covers 70% of the Earth's surface and a significant 7.66% of that, or 27,761,227km2 to be exact, is comprised of 17,495 Marine Protected Areas or "MPAs".They vary in size from the largest MPA in the world, the first Antarctic MPA encompassing 1.55 million km' in the Ross Sea, to one of the smallest: 0.8 hectares of water surrounding the wreck of the HMS Dartmouth, which sank in the Sound of Mull in 1690.