I have been at the 3rd International Marine Protected Areas Congress in Marseilles where there has been a lot of excitement over the recent developments in very large MPAs around the world. Having the largest MPA in your jurisdiction has become one of the more enlightened international games of one-upmanship.

The UK is exploring following up the 564,000 km2 Chagos MPA with another one of its overseas territories, Pitcairn Island. This would create an MPA that would be 836,000 km2 in size, and probably add a decimal or so for the global total which stands at 2.85 million km2. The opportunity to create large MPAs in the few remaining isolated and sparsely populated parts of our ocean is important not to miss.

However, as well as protecting and future-proofing more isolated areas of the globe, it is also important that we focus efforts on reducing the impacts of damaging and unsustainable activities on the more intensively used waters back home in the UK. 

The acronym ‘NEOLI’ may well be one that will soon become a common term amongst those of us who work in Marine Protected Areas. It has been coined by a group of scientists who have just conducted a vast global field study of MPAs. They discovered that the most important aspects of a successful MPA were sites that were No-Take, Enforced, Old, Large and Isolated and have called these ‘NEOLI’ factors. The study will be published in the ‘Nature’ journal later this year. Besides the question of why they passed up on the friendlier sounding LEONI, I wondered what chance we have of achieving these in the UK.

In our more crowded European seas, combining all these factors together is inevitably going to be more challenging. We just don’t have the space to be able to create large, isolated, no-take MPAs. Identifying sites for MPAs in the UK involves delicate planning and trade-offs between many other sea users. However, in place of isolation, we can use our more advanced level of scientific knowledge to ensure that we are protecting those places that are important for biodiversity. 

The other advantage that we have in the UK is the institutional strength and capability to ensure that our MPAs are well managed and enforced. Our network looks impressive in terms of numbers and coverage, but good enforcement and management is still lacking in many sites. 

Investing in effective enforcement will mean that MPAs will fulfil their potential and deliver the resilience and ecosystem benefits that they were designed for. One day they will be old too, and the UK will be on its way up the NEOLI list.