The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status

Marine Policy ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Marine Policy journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/marpol

The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status Daniel C. Dunn 1,a,n, Jeff Ardron 1,b, Nicholas Bax c,d, Patricio Bernal e, Jesse Cleary a, Ian Cresswell c, Ben Donnelly a, Piers Dunstan c, Kristina Gjerde e, David Johnson f, Kristin Kaschner g, Ben Lascelles h, Jake Rice i, Henning von Nordheim j, Louisa Wood k, Patrick N. Halpin a a

Marine Geospatial Ecology Lab, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies, Potsdam, Germany CSIRO Wealth from Oceans Flagship, Hobart, TAS, Australia d Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies, University of Tasmania, Hobart, TAS, Australia e IUCN Global Marine and Polar Programme, Paris, France & Cambridge, MA, USA f Global Ocean Biodiversity Initiative Secretariat, Seascape Consultants Ltd., Romsey, United Kingdom g Department of Biometry and Environmental System Analysis & Evolutionary Biology and Ecology Lab, Institute of Biology I (Zoology), Albert-Ludwigs-University, Freiburg, Germany h BirdLife International, Cambridge, United Kingdom i Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Ottawa, Canada j German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation, Isle of Vilm, Germany k United Nations Environment Programme World Conservation Monitoring Centre, Cambridge, UK b c

art ic l e i nf o

Keywords: Convention on Biological Diversity Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas EBSA Marine Protected Areas Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction High Seas

a b s t r a c t In 2008, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) adopted seven criteria to identify Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas (EBSAs) “…in need of protection, in open ocean waters and deep sea habitats”. This paper reviews the history of the development of the “EBSA process”, which was originally driven by the commitment to establish marine protected areas in areas beyond national jurisdiction, but which has since broadened to encompass the possibility of informing marine spatial planning and other activities, both within and beyond national jurisdiction. Additionally, the paper summarizes ongoing efforts through CBD regional workshops to describe EBSAs and the development of the EBSA Repository, where information on these areas is to be stored. The overlap between the EBSA criteria and biodiversity criteria suites used by various authorities in areas beyond national jurisdiction is illustrated. The EBSA process has reached a critical juncture, whereby a large percentage of the global ocean has been considered by the regional workshops, but the procedure by which these areas can be incorporated into formal management structures has not yet been fully developed. Emerging difficulties regarding the mandate to describe, identify, endorse, or adopt EBSAs, are discussed. & 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Fueled by technological improvements and growing competition for marine resources, human activities have focussed increasingly on areas beyond national jurisdiction (ABNJ). Recognition of the extent [1,2] and impact [3–5] of our activities on the world's oceans, has led to growing awareness and efforts to improve the governance and management of the global ocean, most recently

n Correspondence to: Duke University Marine Lab, 135 Marine Lab Road, Beaufort, NC 28557, USA. Tel.: þ 1 252 504 7677. E-mail address: [email protected] (D.C. Dunn). 1 The first two authors contributed equally to the development of this manuscript.

through the use of area-based management [6]. Tools to inform decisions on how to balance biodiversity conservation needs with sustainable use of environmental/natural resources are increasingly required [7]. There are a wide range of criteria suites to identify areas of ecological importance, including some that focus on taxa individually (e.g., Important Bird Areas [8]) or jointly (e.g., Key Biodiversity Areas [9,10]), to suites for specific habitats (e.g., Ramsar criteria for wetlands),2 or regional criteria suites [11,12]. Since 2006, and in response to the Johannesburg Plan of

2 Adopted by the 7th (1999) and 9th (2005) Meetings of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Wetlands (Ramsar, Iran, 1971), superseding earlier Criteria adopted by the 4th and 6th Meetings of the COP (1990 and 1996), to guide implementation of Article 2.1 on designation of Ramsar sites.

0308-597X/$ - see front matter & 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2013.12.002

Please cite this article as: Dunn DC, et al. The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status. Mar. Policy (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2013.12.002i

D.C. Dunn et al. / Marine Policy ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎

2

COP 7

COP 8

Decides to form an Ad-hoc Working Group on Protected Areas

2005

Calls for the expert workshop on ecological criteria and biogeographic classification

2006

1st Meeting of the CBD Ad-hoc Working Group on Protected Areas Invites the compilation of a list of existing ecological criteria for identification of potential MPAs and biogeographical classification systems

2007

COP 9

COP 10

COP 11

Adopts EBSA criteria. Called for the expert workshop on guidance on the application of the EBSA criteria and biogeographic classifications

Establishes an EBSA Repository and information sharing mechanism and a regional process for identifying candidate EBSAs

Welcomes regional EBSA workshop reports. Included the reports in the EBSA repository, and submitted them to the UNGA and UN agencies, the BBNJ working group and the Regular Process

2008

Canadian Workshop on EBSA criteria

CBD Azores Expert Workshop

Collates criteria suites develops criteria to benefit CBD, FAO & IMO processes

Collates criteria suites, recommends EBSA criteria

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

CBD Ottawa Expert Workshop

2011 EBSA Regional Workshops

2012 EBSA Regional Workshops

2013 EBSA Regional Workshops

Produces guidance on the application of the EBSA criteria

OSPAR/ NEAFC Northeast Atlantic (Sep); Western South Pacific (Nov)

Wider Caribbean & Western Mid Atlantic (Feb); Southern Indian Ocean (July); Eastern Tropical & Temperate Pacific (Aug)

North Pacific (Feb); South eastern Atlantic (Apr)

Fig. 1. The evolution of the EBSA process. While it stemmed from the Programme of Work on Protected Areas within the CBD, the EBSA process has been implemented entirely through recommendations relating to Coastal and Marine Biodiversity. Adapted from Dunn (ed) 2011. Background adapted from Richard Hermann-Galatée films, Census of Marine Life.

Implementation (JPOI) call to establish protected areas globally [13], the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) has sought to develop and employ a broad suite of criteria to describe Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas or “EBSAs” globally in the marine environment. This paper tracks the development of the EBSA criteria and the process used by the CBD to describe areas meeting one or more of these criteria in the marine environment. This process has reached a critical juncture, whereby a large percentage of the global ocean has been considered by an initial round of intergovernmental workshops seeking to describe EBSAs3; however, the procedure by which these areas can be incorporated into formal management structures is not yet developed in detail. This paper provides background to the current EBSA process, and seeks to advance the discussion on how EBSA descriptions could be incorporated into national and international decision-making.

2. Origins of the EBSA process 2.1. Pre-EBSA policy context The Convention on Biological Diversity was opened for signature on June 1992 at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (the Rio “Earth Summit”). The Rio Earth Summit also set forth Agenda 21 and called upon States to “identify marine ecosystems exhibiting high levels of biodiversity and productivity and other critical habitat areas” and to (…) “provide necessary limitations on use in these areas, through, inter alia, designation of protected areas” [14]. Ten years later, in 2002 at the second Earth Summit, the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation (JPOI), confirmed the need to “maintain the productivity and biodiversity of important and vulnerable marine and coastal areas, including in areas within and beyond national jurisdiction”, and provided explicit targets for the “application by 2010 3 For the purposes of this paper we will use the action “to describe EBSAs” to refer to what the CBD officially defines as the “description of areas meeting scientific criteria for EBSAs” (Decision XI/17, Section 9) and “EBSAs” or “EBSA descriptions” to refer to the output from that process.

of the ecosystem approach” and the “establishment of marine protected areas consistent with international law and based on scientific information, including representative networks by 2012” [13]. Despite some progress regionally and nationally [15], global protection of marine biodiversity remained inadequate, and in 2004 the 7th Conference of Parties (COP 7) to the CBD committed to the target in the JPOI for representative networks of MPAs by 2012 [16]. CBD COP 7 set a target that there should be: “Effective conservation of at least 10% of each of the world's ecological regions by 2010”, which was endorsed by COP 8 in 2006 [17]. CBD COP 7 established an Ad-hoc Open-ended Working Group on Protected Areas (PAWG), which met in Montecatini, Italy in 2005 (Fig. 1). The first substantive agenda item was (1) “options for cooperation for the establishment of marine protected areas in marine areas beyond the limits of national jurisdiction” [18]. However, the larger question of what mandate the CBD had in governance of ABNJ impeded further progress. A “friends of the chair” sub-group led by Canada concluded that existing criteria should be compiled and synthesized as a basis for future work, and the Government of Canada offered to host a workshop on the issue [19]. Before the CBD PAWG met in Montecatini, Canada had begun a national effort to advance its integrated management process, as mandated under the 1996 Oceans Act [20]. Scientific criteria had been developed “to facilitate provision of a greater-than-usual degree of risk aversion in management of activities in such areas” [21], and were coined “Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas” (EBSAs). The Canadian EBSA criteria (Uniqueness, Aggregation, and Fitness Consequence, with two additional criteria: Resilience and Naturalness) were presented in Montecatini. Hence, while the early development of the CBD EBSA process had its beginnings in efforts to identify networks of marine protected areas (MPAs)4 in ABNJ, EBSA criteria were already being employed nationally within integrated management strategies to generally identify areas requiring more risk-averse management.

4 We use the term “marine protected area” as defined by the IUCN [47,48] and including all categories therein. Further we differentiate the term from no-take marine reserves which refer solely to IUCN Category I protected areas.

Please cite this article as: Dunn DC, et al. The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status. Mar. Policy (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2013.12.002i

D.C. Dunn et al. / Marine Policy ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎

2.2. Development of the EBSA criteria 2.2.1. First Ottawa workshop (2005) Canada hosted a meeting in Ottawa to further consider criteria that could lead to the selection of EBSAs in ABNJ. It set out to inform not just the CBD, but also the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) of the United Nations (UN) and the International Maritime Organization (IMO). It sought a broad and overarching set of criteria that could be used by all three organizations and “contribute to a shared scientific basis for their dialogue and action” [22]. This recognized explicitly that although the CBD mandated focus was on criteria to inform identification of areas for MPAs and networks of protected areas, the functions of the criteria were being viewed broadly as contributing to conservation planning across agencies. A draft background paper by Dearden and Topelko [23] provided a thorough review of major criteria suites for MPA site selection and network selection. Although the criteria that were derived from these discussions were also called EBSA criteria, they differed from the Canadian national EBSA criteria (see above). The experts in Ottawa defined six EBSA criteria: Uniqueness, Life history stages, Vulnerability, Productivity, Biological Diversity and Naturalness (Representativity was considered separately). The final report of the workshop was transmitted to the CBD Parties as a background document at COP 8 in 2006 [22]. 2.2.2. CBD COP 8 (2006) and the CBD (Azores) workshop (2007) Debate regarding the role of the CBD in ABNJ,5 already an obstacle in Montecatini, arose again at COP 8 in 2006. Concerns were raised that criteria were developed without full consultation of all nations, and hence in the final recommendations, there is little reference to the Montecatini workshop, and no mention of the Ottawa workshop. However, progress was made on defining the CBD's role in ABNJ. It was agreed the CBD would focus “on provision of scientific and, as appropriate, technical information and advice relating to marine biological diversity, the application of the ecosystem approach and the precautionary approach, and in delivering the 2010 target [for protected areas]” [24]. Further, COP 8 called for the convening of an expert workshop to “refine and develop a consolidated set of scientific criteria for identifying ecologically or biologically significant marine areas in need of protection” [25]. This delineation of a boundary between the provision of scientific and technical advice and provision of advice on policy and management has strongly influenced dialog and action within CBD and its expert processes to the present. The ensuing CBD Expert Workshop in 2007 hosted by Portugal/ The Azores, considered an updated version of the Dearden and Topelko review [23] and included the 2005 Ottawa workshop report as a background document. During the workshop, the EBSA criteria were further refined, resulting in a set of seven site criteria: 1. Uniqueness or rarity. 2. Special importance for life history of species. 5 Relevant articles informing the debate over the role of the CBD in ABNJ include Article 3, which restates the international legal principle that “States have…the responsibility to ensure that activities within their jurisdiction or control do not cause damage to the environment of other States or of areas beyond the limits of national jurisdiction.” Article 4, which focuses the application of the CBD to the effects of processes and activities under the jurisdiction or control of Contracting States in areas beyond national jurisdiction, but not directly over the components of biological diversity. Article 5, which calls for Contracting Parties to cooperate with other Contracting Parties, directly or, where appropriate, through competent international organizations, in respect of areas beyond national jurisdiction, and Article 22.2 which provides that “Contracting Parties shall implement this Convention with respect to the marine environment consistently with the rights and obligations of States under the law of the sea.”

3

3. Importance for threatened, endangered or declining species and/or habitats. 4. Vulnerability, fragility, sensitivity, slow recovery. 5. Biological productivity. 6. Biological diversity. 7. Naturalness. While the inclusion of an endangered species criterion separate from the importance to life history criterion was a notable change,6 the major addition made by the Azores workshop was to separate out representativity as part of a new discrete set of MPA network criteria [26]. Other identified, network level criteria included connectivity, replication and adequacy and viability. It was agreed that future development of MPA networks should include EBSAs as one of the five MPA network design criteria, and a link between the two criteria suites was established. Their inclusion as one criterion for MPA network design was not intended to mean all EBSAs, or the full extent of any given EBSA, would become MPAs; just that they should be considered with regard to the contribution they could make to the design of MPA networks, and that some EBSAs (in part or in whole) should be included in MPA networks. 2.2.3. CBD COP 9 (2008) At COP 9 in Bonn, Germany, the seven EBSA criteria and five MPA network criteria (renamed “scientific guidance for designing networks of MPAs”) were adopted in Decision IX/20, and included as Annexes 1 and 2, respectively. This choice of language reflected a commitment by the Parties to the CBD that not only were the criteria and guidance helpful, but that they would actually be used in the identification of marine areas “in need of protection in open-ocean waters and deep-sea habitats” [27]. The separation of site-level criteria and network-level approaches was a unique CBD development, and remains the only internationally agreed-upon criteria system to formally recognize this distinction. It established a process that allowed the CBD to first focus on site-level description of EBSAs, in advance of any consideration by other bodies of management regimes such as networks of MPAs. The separation of the criteria suites has thus allowed EBSA descriptions to be useful for more than solely the design of networks of MPAs and has been an important acknowledgment of the desire of many Parties to broaden the scope of the EBSA process. 2.2.4. CBD (Ottawa) workshop (2009) While COP 9 adopted the criteria, there remained concerns about how the criteria would be applied. COP 9 therefore called for a follow-on CBD Expert Workshop to provide “scientific and technical guidance on the use of biogeographic classification systems and identification of marine areas beyond national jurisdiction in need of protection” [28]. Canada together with Germany agreed to hold a CBD Expert Workshop in Ottawa in 2009. At the workshop a series of expert presentations on how to apply the EBSA criteria were provided, including from the newly organized Global Ocean Biodiversity Initiative (GOBI)7 [29]. While the focus of the workshop was on application of the EBSA criteria in ABNJ, the workshop concluded, inter alia, that “there are no inherent incompatibilities between the various sets of criteria that have been applied nationally and by various inter-governmental 6 This was debated at length at the workshop. In the end it was agreed, however, that the lower standard of evidence that an area was used by endangered species (“Areas containing habitat for the survival and recovery…”) compared to the life history criterion (“Areas that are required for a population to survive and thrive”) justified their separation. 7 GOBI was formed as a specific response to the CBD's adoption of the EBSA criteria in 2008, with the support of Germany, the COP 9 President.

Please cite this article as: Dunn DC, et al. The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status. Mar. Policy (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2013.12.002i

4

D.C. Dunn et al. / Marine Policy ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎

organizations (IGOs; e.g., FAO [30], IMO [31], ISA [32]) and environmental non-governmental organizations (NGOs); e.g., BirdLife International [8] and Conservation International [9]” and went on to point out that “unlike the CBD EBSA criteria some of the criteria applied by other UN agencies include considerations of vulnerability to specific activities” [33]. The EBSA process to date has limited its assessment of the vulnerability (the fourth EBSA criterion) of particular sites to inherent structural habitat features or life history characteristics (e.g., late maturity, slow growth, low fecundity, etc.), noting that human activities (not considered in the EBSA criteria) and their impacts would usually influence what is deemed to be vulnerable.

2.2.5. COP 10 (2010) In 2010, the CBD COP 10 in Japan adopted the Aichi Biodiversity Targets, of which target 11 reaffirmed the call for “10% of coastal and marine areas, especially areas of particular importance for biodiversity and ecosystem services, are conserved through effectively and equitably managed, ecologically representative and well-connected systems of protected areas and other effective area-based conservation measures” [34]. COP 10 also noted with concern the slow progress towards achieving the 2012 target of establishment of MPAs [35] and took note of the results of the CBD Ottawa Expert Workshop. It was within this context that the Parties agreed on a process for describing EBSAs through a series of regional workshops [36]. The Decision reflected a willingness by Parties to move ahead with the use of the criteria. The COP 10 decisions not only regionalized the process, but also broadened it from previously only considering ABNJ to include, where desired by certain Parties, marine areas within national jurisdiction. All draft language that exclusively referred to ABNJ was removed. The Parties also requested the Executive Secretary to “establish a Repository for scientific and technical information and experience related to the application of the scientific criteria on the identification of EBSAs (…) and to develop an information-sharing mechanism” [37] and invited Parties and Governments to contribute information and experiences from the application of nationally

or internationally agreed upon criteria within national jurisdiction to the Repository.

3. The current status of the EBSA process 3.1. The State-based, regional approach The current EBSA process is undertaken using a structured UN regional approach and reflects typical practice of UN agencies to accommodate regional differences in needs, capacities and culture. It is also consistent with the approach of the Regional Seas Programme, and with regional fisheries management organizations and agreements (RFMO/As). Further, it is ecologically and politically coherent as it recognizes the fundamentally connected nature of the marine environment at a regional scale, and the consequent responsibility which nations have toward their neighbors when their actions affect shared resources. Fig. 2 presents a schematic workflow of the process adopted by the Parties at COP 10 whereby intergovernmental regional workshops are used to describe potential areas meeting the EBSA criteria. The “scientific and technical data and information and results collated through the workshops” would be shared with relevant agencies, organization and partners, and compiled into a report to be forwarded to the next meeting of the CBD Subsidiary Body for Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice (SBSTTA) [38]. SBSTTA would then recommend specific EBSA descriptions to be included in a synthesis report to the COP, which would have an opportunity to consider and “endorse” the synthesis report and described EBSAs. The final endorsed EBSA descriptions would then be entered in to the CBD EBSA Repository and submitted to the UN General Assembly, the Parties, other Governments, and other relevant international organizations [38]. 3.1.1. The EBSA regional workshops The CBD Secretariat with regional partner organizations convened six regional workshops between November 2011 and April 2013 to enable the description of areas meeting the EBSA criteria

Fig. 2. The CBD EBSAs description and information sharing process. EBSA descriptions are developed through a regional, State-based process, reviewed and synthesized by SBSTTA and disseminated by the COP to relevant bodies. Adapted from Dunn (ed) 2011.

Please cite this article as: Dunn DC, et al. The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status. Mar. Policy (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2013.12.002i

D.C. Dunn et al. / Marine Policy ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎ Table 1 CBD Regional EBSA workshops and other relevant meetings. Regional workshop on EBSAs

Date

Host country

OSPAR/NEAFC Northeast Atlantica Western South Pacific Wider Caribbean and Western Mid-Atlantic Southern Indian Ocean Eastern Tropical and Temperate Pacific North Pacific South-Eastern Atlantic Mediterranean Synthesis Reporta

Sep-11 Nov-11 Feb-12 Jul-12 Aug-12 Feb-13 Apr-13 NA

France Fiji Brazil Mauritius Ecuador Russia Namibia NA

a

Not organized by the CBD Secretariat.

(Table 1). Prior to these, in September 2011, a similar workshop was held by the Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic (OSPAR) and the NorthEast Atlantic Fisheries Commission (NEAFC), which was attended by the CBD Secretariat. In the Mediterranean region, an explicit EBSA workshop was not held; rather, results from the Mediterranean Action Plan under the Barcelona Convention Regional Seas Programme were transmitted directly to SBSTTA for consideration. All descriptions of EBSAs at the regional workshops were subject to consensus agreement among Party nominated experts in plenary. A defining factor in any workshop is the make-up of those attending. For the regional CBD EBSA workshops, attendance has been by invitation only with intergovernmental experts nominated by the Parties, and recognized organizations (including ENGOs and industry groups) invited through the CBD. Where international experts/observers have been invited, they have typically been those who had data to contribute to the regional process. The make-up of the regional workshops (i.e., largely experts nominated by their government) reinforced the Statebased, limited access nature of the EBSA process as defined at CBD COP 10. Workshops have been supported by GOBI partners, i.e. by technical teams from either the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO; Australia) or Duke University (USA) who assisted through the compilation of global datasets and a data report prior to each workshop (providing a consistent core of base environmental conditions across the workshops to supplement the available regional datasets), data access mapping and interpretation, and the development of EBSA descriptions at the meetings. The participation of the CBD Secretariat and technical teams helped to ensure consistency across workshops. Three further workshops have been planned for early 2014 covering the Arctic, the Northwest Atlantic and the Mediterranean.

3.1.2. Capacity building/training to support the EBSA process In the context of describing EBSAs, COP 10 emphasized that “workshops are likely to be necessary for training and capacitybuilding”, but did not request them [39]. Consequently, the amount of training provided at each workshop has evolved over time. The South West Pacific workshop, held in November 2011, only included a short session dedicated to building the understanding of the EBSA process and the available data. Participants were not comfortable with the details of how potential EBSAs would be described until they used their expertise on the data in latter parts of the workshop. A similar pattern emerged during the Caribbean and Mid Atlantic workshop (though see the description of Brazil's pre-workshop activities below). Learning from the first two workshops, the CBD secretariat increased the length of subsequent workshops to allow for further training. This significantly improved the effectiveness of workshop participants in describing potential EBSAs. Going even further, a

5

later workshop, in the South East Atlantic, was preceded by a 5day capacity building workshop held in Senegal 2 months prior to the EBSA workshop and supported by the Sustainable Ocean Initiative.8 The workshop provided an overview of EBSAs, MPAs, and ecosystem-based fisheries management. The expanded capacity building phase for this region was in response to calls from African nations at the SBSTTA 16 in 2012 for greater involvement and capacity building in the EBSA process. This level of training provided strong outcomes at the subsequent EBSA workshop, allowing the workshop to focus on the description of areas meeting the EBSA criteria. The importance of, and the wish of parties for, capacity building in the regional approach to describing EBSAs cannot be overstated. Those workshops with some level of capacity building organized either nationally or in conjunction with the CBD prior to the workshop had a higher number of EBSA proposals submitted prior to the workshop. For example, one party (Brazil) held a national meeting before the regional workshop that provided them the opportunity to identify EBSAs in their national waters. In comparison, only a small numbers of EBSA descriptions were proposed before three of the other regional workshops (Eastern Tropical Pacific Ocean, Southern Indian Ocean, and North Pacific Ocean); no EBSAs were described prior to the first EBSA regional workshop in the Western South Pacific Ocean. Improved understanding of the EBSA process prior to the workshops reduced the amount of time spent in each workshop relating the process and how EBSAs could be described. Increased capacity and engagement was reflected in the number of pre-workshop submissions, but such submissions were not a prerequisite for a successful workshop, and arguably resulted in countries being less flexible to changes to the EBSA description during the workshop. Hence, while pre-meeting training and EBSA preparation formed a valuable component of some regional processes, the cooperative development and review of EBSAs descriptions during the workshops remained central to their success. 3.2. The EBSA Repository and information sharing mechanism According to the process laid out by the Parties at COP 10, the results of the regional EBSA workshops were meant to be stored in a CBD EBSA Repository. In 2011, the CBD Secretariat awarded a consultancy for a prototype Repository to members of GOBI. The consultancy considered and adapted a web-tool they had developed earlier to gather information (e.g. documents, figures and spatial data) on how areas might meet the EBSA and other criteria suites via a web-based survey that was open to all interested researchers, NGOs, practitioners and academics seeking to inform the EBSA process. However, this open-submission process was philosophically incompatible with the State-based regional process for describing EBSAs agreed to by COP 10 (Fig. 2). In the prototype CBD Repository, an EBSA description moves through various stages of development and official review within the Repository, with each stage assigned specific, password protected, user access and distribution rights. In all regional workshops to date, EBSA descriptions have been made available in the final workshop report, and spatial data have been stored by the technical support teams. However, the lack of a CBD-hosted Repository that displays the results of the regional EBSA workshops and supporting data is a critical gap in the current process, and does not readily allow for external usage, interactive geographical searching or open review by civil society. 8 The Sustainable Ocean Initiative is a program funded by Japan, which held the presidency of the CBD at the time, “to enhance capacity to achieve the CBD's Aichi Biodiversity Targets related to marine and coastal biodiversity in a holistic manner.” (http://www.cbd.int/marine/doc/soi-brochure-2012-en.pdf).

Please cite this article as: Dunn DC, et al. The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status. Mar. Policy (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2013.12.002i

D.C. Dunn et al. / Marine Policy ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎

6

Such a Repository could document and publicize the progress of the CBD EBSA effort, and serve as a model for integrating parallel processes, such as the identification of Vulnerable Marine Ecosystems (VMEs).

3.3. Post-regional EBSA workshop developments From 2004 to 2012, there has been a steady evolution in the development of the EBSA criteria and the description of areas that met those criteria. Each CBD COP took a step forward toward the agreed upon goal of describing EBSAs, and from 2010 onward, the CBD Secretariat worked at a fast pace, organizing six regional workshops and collating the results in 18 months. However, in May 2012, SBSTTA 16 saw the first signs of possible problems in this process. Questions arose around whether the recommendations coming out of SBSTTA, which is the baseline text for discussions at the COP, should “endorse” or “take note of” the SBSTTA synthesis report of the EBSA workshop results. One Party stated that the SBSTTA could not endorse the report as that was the exclusive role of the COP. Hence, the word “endorse” was bracketed9 in the draft recommendations going to COP 11. Failure to “endorse” the synthesis report threatened to stop the process and prevent dissemination of the described EBSAs. The discussion continued at COP 11 in October 2012, however this time the argument was reversed: a number of countries now argued that it was not the COP's place to endorse a scientific report that SBSTTA had not been able to endorse unanimously. Specifically, they felt it was not the role of the CBD COP to endorse the overwhelming amount of scientific and technical information in the SBSTTA synthesis report. As a compromise, CBD COP 11 requested “the Executive Secretary to include the summary reports on the description of areas that meet the criteria for EBSAs (…) in the Repository (…) and (…) to submit them to the UNGA [and relevant organizations]” [40]. Thus, without formally endorsing or otherwise passing judgment on the SBSTTA synthesis report, the Parties approved dissemination of the report (which was officially sent by the CBD Executive Secretary to the UN Secretary General on 19 March 2013). Several countries questioned whether this recommendation was in line with the process outlined in Decision X/29. There was consensus, however, that the results of the CBD EBSA workshops should provide an important contribution to UN negotiations on how to manage and conserve biodiversity in ABNJ and they have been communicated accordingly [41]. The circular argument that SBSTTA has the technical capacity to review the workshop reports but not the political capacity to suggest their endorsement, while the COP had the political power to endorse them but not the technical capacity to review them, may reflect some Parties' discomfort with aspects of the process (e.g. if they were not represented in regional meetings) and/or the longer term implications of it (in this case the possible delineation of MPAs in ABNJ). Alternatively, consensus may not have been reached due to ambiguity surrounding the word “endorse” (or its translation in other languages) which could imply an action that is outside the legal competence of the CBD. One other possible explanation for the lack of consensus may be a determination by certain Parties that substantive discussions should be held at the UNGA, not the CBD. Furthermore, developing States have been particularly concerned that movement forward on the conservation of ABNJ at the UNGA should be accompanied with progress on the issue of access and benefit sharing of marine genetic resources. 9 Bracketed text signifies that consensus was not achieved on the recommendation language and implies no formal acceptance by the body (e.g., SBSTTA or COP).

4. Discussion: the utility of describing EBSAs 4.1. Commonality of the EBSA criteria with those of other IGOs/ processes As the CBD acts through the authority of its Parties, the real utility of describing EBSAs lies in the relationship between the CBD and the CBD Parties (for EBSAs in national jurisdiction), and other UN processes, international agreements, conventions, arrangements, and related competent management authorities for ABNJ. In the long-term, EBSAs may contribute to a network of MPAs as indicated in Annex II of COP Decision IX/20. However, the legal process and international agreements necessary for achieving this are only now being debated. EBSAs can already inform existing regional and global management bodies with responsibility beyond national jurisdictions in both conservation and sustainable use and this requires no additional legal process. Governance of human activities in ABNJ is distributed across a number of international institutions, all of which have adopted decisions that describe the importance of biodiversity and the need to manage the activities under their purview so as to limit adverse impacts to marine ecosystems. Many of these management authorities have also promulgated suites of criteria for the identification of areas of biological or ecological importance to support conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity and nonliving resources (Fig. 3). Not surprisingly, the overlap between these criteria suites and the EBSA criteria is significant (Table 2), since the EBSA criteria were developed through the consideration of extant systems. The Parties to the CBD clearly understand the potential benefits to collaboration and sharing among conventions, agencies and organizations, and have repeatedly requested a cooperative approach [e.g. 36,42]. Responding to this, the majority of the regional Expert Workshops have been jointly hosted by the CBD, a national government and RFMOs or Regional Seas Programmes. However, EBSAs are still new to the international community, and do not formally have any status in, or have yet to feature in, any decision-making processes in ABNJ.10

4.2. Broadening the EBSA process to include areas within national jurisdiction The CBD Secretariat has a key role in the provision of information, guidelines and (when requested) technical assistance to its Parties to support the identification of EBSAs within national jurisdictions. The recognition of this element of the EBSA process was provided at COP 10 through the removal of references to ABNJ in the recommendations pertaining to EBSAs. The broadening of the scope of the process to include areas within national jurisdiction means that developing countries can use the process to (1) support CBD National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans, (2) promote the status of previously identified national protected areas, and (3) potentially increase access to international funding for area-based planning, resource management and conservation efforts. At the regional EBSA workshops, a number of countries reported that national processes were already underway to identify EBSAs within national waters and other countries were intending to use the EBSAs agreed to by regional experts to support marine management within their national jurisdiction. For example EBSAs identified in the Western South Pacific regional 10 Noting the on-going OSPAR and NEAFC processes in the North-East Atlantic, where described EBSAs are now under consideration as well as developments for the Sargasso Sea [49].

Please cite this article as: Dunn DC, et al. The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status. Mar. Policy (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2013.12.002i

D.C. Dunn et al. / Marine Policy ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎

7

Fig. 3. UN Agencies, Programmes and related organizations with criteria suites to identify important marine areas in need of heightened management. The names given to such areas are italicized in bold. Adapted from Dunn (ed) 2011.

Table 2 Correspondence between the CBD EBSA criteria and other international criteria used by IGOs and NGOs (i.e. Birdlife and IUCN) mentioned in this manuscript. Correspondence is indicated by either a check where it exists, an X where it doesn’t, or a ? where there is uncertainty or the criteria suite is under review. Organization

CBD

FAO

IMO

UNESCO

RAMSAR

Birdlife

IUCN

Site criteria Uniqueness or rarity Special importance for life history stages of species Importance to threatened or endangered species Vulnerability, fragility, sensitivity or slow recovery Productivity Biodiversity Naturalness Structure Historical geomorphological importance

EBSA ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ X X

VME ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ X X X ✔ X

PSSA ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ X

WHS ✔ ✔ ✔ X ✔ ✔ ✔ X ✔

RAMSAR ✔ ✔ ✔ ? X ✔ ✔ X X

IBA ✔ ✔ ✔ X X X X X X

KBAa ✔ ✔ ✔ ? ? ? ? ? X

a

The KBA criteria are currently under review and is likely to be expanded to be more inclusive.

workshop provided input to the Cook Island's intention to declare a marine reserve in their exclusive economic zone (EEZ). 4.3. The relationship between EBSAs and MPAs Within national jurisdictions there are already cases of national EBSA type description processes informing the selection of areas for MPA designation (e.g., Canada, Australia, Korea and Japan). Although the impetus for the CBD to develop and adopt EBSA criteria was directly linked to a call for more effective conservation in ABNJ, including through the establishment of representative networks of MPAs, there has been an on-going debate about how such networks would be established and managed. The approach taken at the Azores workshop that separated site-level EBSA criteria from the network-level MPA criteria has allowed the process for describing ecologically important areas to be separated from the process of MPA establishment. It has been stressed at every COP, SBSTTA and CBD workshop since that the description of EBSAs is a scientific exercise that should not be conflated with any

potential management requirements, and describing EBSAs does not come with any obligation to turn them into MPAs or other management commitments [e.g. 43,44]. Notwithstanding their usefulness for a range of potential management arrangements, there is a linkage between EBSAs and possible future MPAs, when the EBSAs contribute to network goals or when MPA designation is a preferred means of providing the enhanced management required. Concerns about the risk of treating all EBSA descriptions as a first step to calls for designation of the area as an MPA continue to arise in some regional workshops, and SBSTTA and COP debates about handling workshop summary reports. Although the CBD cannot be the forum for establishing MPAs in ABNJ, commitments for such MPAs have been made many times, including WSSD 2002, UNGA Resolution 57/141, CBD Aichi Target 11 and Rio þ20. These policy commitments, as well as the underlying ecological requirements [47], mean that the UNGA will need to identify a process to successfully bring forward, designate, and manage MPAs in ABNJ, and facilitate marine spatial planning (MSP) more generally. Such a process should

Please cite this article as: Dunn DC, et al. The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status. Mar. Policy (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2013.12.002i

D.C. Dunn et al. / Marine Policy ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎

8

make use of the EBSAs that have been described in the regional workshops. 4.4. The relationship between EBSAs and MSP The sheer size of some of the EBSAs described in the regional workshops is such that no single type of conservation measure can be expected to deliver appropriate protection at appropriate societal cost to the entire area. For example, the Equatorial Upwelling Zone in the Pacific Ocean, described as an EBSA on its western half by the regional workshop held in Fiji, and its eastern side by the regional workshop held in Galapagos, is a planetary feature of a magnitude comparable to the Amazon basin's tropical forests. A single management approach for an area of that size, and particularly designation of such a large area as a no-take marine reserve, would very likely be opposed. Rather, as already suggested by Weaver and Johnson [45], EBSAs of all sizes lend themselves to be used as inputs to a rational framework for regional, ecosystem based, MSP processes, where a variety of management tools, spatial and dynamic, can be applied by competent authorities. Within such an MSP process, EBSAs present areas that may require more risk-adverse management, including area-based management, which takes into consideration their needs and vulnerability to a range of activities. Risk assessments, including environmental impact assessments, are an important part of MSP and area-based management. These assessments can benefit from knowledge of the properties of EBSAs and help guide the selection of measures that ensure the EBSAs receive a relatively higher level of precaution. This is particularly true for EBSAs that may experience cumulative or synergistic impacts. For example, information on spawning, breeding or feeding grounds or migratory corridors collected through the description of how areas meet EBSA criteria 2 and 3 (the life history and endangered species criteria) might be used to decrease the risk of ship strikes or harmful fisheries bycatch. The identification of unique or rare areas (EBSA criterion 1) or areas with high biological diversity (EBSA criterion 6) might indicate an increased probability of discovering new genetic diversity. Scientific discovery could be prioritized for such EBSAs within an MSP. EBSAs also indicate areas of the ocean where observations could be focussed to monitor ecosystem health, as they are areas of relatively higher value than the surrounding seas. Providing such information to management authorities or planning processes can only improve their ability to sustainably manage the resources under their purview. The need for competent authorities to coordinate their planning activities, particularly within EBSAs, is an issue that is yet to be addressed, and yet is critical to successful MSP in ABNJ [46,47].

allowed for an approach compatible with other biodiversity criteria suites. Therefore, the EBSA criteria represent a common currency across marine/maritime sectors which have stimulated a new multi-party dialog amongst the CBD and international conservation agreements, sectoral management bodies, and States. However, to be useful to these bodies' future planning efforts, the EBSA Repository will have to be made fully functional, providing access to EBSA descriptions and their supporting data. As outlined in this paper, some challenges have arisen in the EBSA process. CBD Parties will need to support the procedure agreed-upon at COP 10 whereby described EBSAs and their associated data can be shared amongst States and the competent authorities in a timely manner that conveys the Parties' support for the results. As the CBD Secretariat wraps up the initial round of EBSA regional workshops, it is time to pause and consider next steps. At all regional workshops participants have agreed that this should not be a “one-off” process, and have requested future workshops, requiring further funding and planning by the CBD. Beyond the EBSA workshops, however, there remains the second adopted annex to Decision IX/20, regarding the “scientific guidance for designing networks of MPAs” in ABNJ which include EBSAs as one of the five criteria. To clarify or create an effective global mechanism whereby EBSAs and their descriptions could be used alongside biogeographies and other relevant information, the UNGA will need to move decisively on the call in paragraph 162 of Rioþ 20 to address, “…on an urgent basis, the issue of the conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction, including by taking a decision on the development of an international instrument under the Convention on the Law of the Sea.”

Acknowledgments Daniel Dunn, Jesse Cleary, Ben Donnelly and Pat Halpin gratefully acknowledge primary support for the development of this manuscript by the Lenfest Foundation as part of the Pelagic Conservation in the Open Ocean Grant. Daniel Dunn and Louisa Wood were supported by the NF-UBC Nereus Program. Nic Bax was supported by the Australian Government's National Environment Research Program, Marine Biodiversity Hub. Kristin Kaschner's work on the manuscript was conducted while working on the PELAGIC Project co-financed by the Fondation pour la Recherche en Biodiversité and Fondation Total. Patricio Bernal gratefully acknowledges the Alfred Sloan Foundation, the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation, and IUCN for its partial support during 2012–13. References

5. Next steps While our understanding of the utility of describing EBSAs has expanded over the last decade, there remain questions about the role that EBSAs play within a broader management framework. Building on proactive efforts by Canada, the early recommendations that led to the formation of what is now known as the EBSA process were initially structured around CBD's scientific advisory role on how to better conserve biodiversity in ABNJ, including through the establishment of protected areas in ABNJ. A number of States, regional, and international organizations have experience with criteria suites similar to that used in the EBSA process and have also used these to prioritize planning and management and monitoring. In this light, the development of the inclusive EBSA criteria, which incorporate many aspects of previous criteria systems, both within and beyond national jurisdiction, has

[1] Halpern BS, Walbridge S, Selkoe KA, Kappel CV, Micheli F, D’Agrosa C, et al. A global map of human impact on marine ecosystems. Science 2008;319: 948–52. [2] Stewart KR, Lewison RL, Dunn DC, Bjorkland RH, Kelez S, Halpin PN, et al. Characterizing fishing effort and spatial extent of coastal fisheries. PLoS One 2010;5:e14451. [3] Dayton PK, Thrush SF, Agardy MT, Hofman RJ. Environmental effects of marine fishing. Aquat Conserv 1995;5:205–32. [4] Sala E, Knowlton N. Global marine biodiversity trends. Annu Rev Environ Resour 2006;31:93–122. [5] Worm B, Barbier EB, Beaumont N, Duffy JE, Folke C, Halpern BS, et al. Impacts of biodiversity loss on ocean ecosystem services. Science 2006;314:787–90. [6] Young OR, Osherenko G, Ekstrom J, Crowder LB, Ogden J, Wilson JA, et al. Solving the crisis in ocean governance: place-based management of marine ecosystems, Enviroment 2007;49:20–32. [7] Gilman E, Dunn DC, Read A, Hyrenbach KD, Warner R. Designing criteria suites to identify discrete and networked sites of high value across manifestations of biodiversity. Biodivers Conserv 2011;20:3363–83. [8] Fishpool LDC, Heath MF, Waliczky Z, Wege DC, Crosby MJ. Important bird areas criteria for selecting sites of global conservation significance. In: Adams NJ,

Please cite this article as: Dunn DC, et al. The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status. Mar. Policy (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2013.12.002i

D.C. Dunn et al. / Marine Policy ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎

[9] [10]

[11]

[12]

[13]

[14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21]

[22]

[23]

[24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29]

Slotow RH, editors. Important bird areas criteria for selecting sites of global conservation significance. Proceedings of the 22 international ornithological congress, Durban. Ostrich. vol. 69; 1998. p. 428. Eken G, Bennun L, Brooks TM, Darwall W, Fishpool LDC, Foster M, et al. Key biodiversity areas as site conservation targets. Bioscience 2004;54:1110–8. Edgar GJ, Langhammer PF, Allen G, Mcmanus R, Millar AJK, Mugo R. Key biodiversity areas as globally significant target sites for the conservation of marine biological diversity. Aquat Conserv 2008;983:969–83. OSPAR. Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic. Guidelines for the identification and selection of marine protected areas in the OSPAR maritime area. OSPAR; 2003-17. Section A-4.44 b(i). Helsinki Commission. Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission, Nature Protection and Biodiversity Group. Minutes of the eighth meeting; 2006. Annex 4. UN. Report of the World Summit on sustainable development, Johannesburg, South Africa; 26 August–4 September 2002. A/CONF.199/20 supra note 1. Sections 30(d) and 32(c). UN. United Nations conference on environment and development, agenda 21. Rio de Janerio, Brazil; 1992. Section 17.85. Wood LJ, Fish L, Laughren J, Pauly D. Assessing progress towards global marine protection targets: shortfalls in information and action. Oryx 2008;42:340–51. CBD. Decision VII/5, Section 19; 2004. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/decisions/ cop/?m=cop-07〉. CBD. Decision VIII/15, Annex IV; 2006. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/decisions/ cop/?m=cop-08〉. CBD. Annotations to the provisional agenda. First meeting of the Ad hoc openended working group on protected areas; 2005. UNEP/CBD/WG-PA/1/1/Add.1. CBD. Report of the first meeting of the Ad hoc open-ended working group on protected areas; 2005. UNEP/CBD/WG-PA/1/6. Canada. Oceans Act, S.C. 1996 c. 31; 1996. DFO (Fisheries and Oceans Canada). Identification of ecologically and biologically significant areas. DFO Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat. Ecosystem status rep. 2004/006. CBD. Report of the scientific experts' workshop on criteria for identifying ecologically or biologically significant areas beyond national jurisdiction. 6–8 December 2005. Ottawa, Canada; 2006. UNEP/CBD/COP/8/INF/39. Dearden P, Topelko KN. Establishing criteria for the identification of ecologically and biologically significant areas on the high seas. Background paper for the CBD expert workshop on ecological criteria and biogeographic classification systems for marine areas in need of protection. CBD; 2005. CBD. Decision VIII/24, Section 42; 2006. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/deci sions/cop/?m=cop-08〉. CBD. Decision VIII/24, Sections 44(b) and 46; 2006. Online: 〈http://www.cbd. int/decisions/cop/?m=cop-08〉. CBD. Expert workshop on ecological criteria and biogeographic classification systems for marine areas in need of protection; 2007. UNEP/CBD/EWS.MPA/1/2. CBD. Decision IX/20, Section 18 and Annex I; 2008. Online: 〈http://www.cbd. int/decisions/cop/?m=cop-09〉. CBD. Decision IX/20, Sections 14 and 19; 2008. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/ decisions/cop/?m=cop-09〉. Ardron AJ, Dunn D, Corrigan C, Gjerde K, Halpin P, Vanden Berghe E, et al. Defining ecologically or biologically significant areas in the open oceans and deep seas: analysis, tools, resources and illustrations. IUCN; 2009.

9

[30] FAO. International guidelines for the management of deep-sea fisheries in the High Seas. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations; 2009. [31] IMO. Revised guidelines for the identification and designation of particularly sensitive sea areas. International Maritime Organization; 2005. Resolution A.982(24). [32] Smith CR, Gaines S, Friedlander A, Morgan C, Thurnherr A, Watling L, et al. Preservation reference areas for nodule mining in the clarion-clipperton zone: rationale and recommendations to the International Seabed Authority. ISA; 2008. [33] CBD. Report of the expert workshop on scientific and technical guidance on the use of biogeographic classification systems and identification of marine areas beyond national jurisdiction in need of protection. Fourteenth meeting of the subsidiary body on scientific, technical & technological advice; 2010. [34] CBD. The strategic plan for biodiversity 2011–2020 and the aichi biodiversity targets. CBD COP Decision X/2 annex of the conference of the parties; 2010. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/decisions/cop/?m=cop-10〉. [35] CBD. COP Decision X/29, Section 4; 2010. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/ decisions/cop/?m=cop-10〉. [36] CBD. COP 10 Decision X/29, Section 32; 2010. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/ decisions/cop/?m=cop-10〉. [37] CBD. COP Decision X/29, Section 39; 2010. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/ decisions/cop/?m=cop-10〉. [38] CBD. Decision X/29, Sections 41 and 42; 2010. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/ decisions/cop/?m=cop-10〉. [39] CBD. Decision X/29, Section 37; 2010. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/decisions/ cop/?m=cop-10〉. [40] CBD. Decision XI/17, Section 17; 2012. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/decisions/ cop/?m=cop-11〉. [41] CBD. Notification: summary reports on the description of areas that meet the criteria for ecologically or biologically significant marine areas, prepared by the Subsidiary body on scientific, technical and technological advice at its sixteenth meeting; 2013. SCBD/SA 2013:2. [42] CBD. Decision IX/20, Section 8; 2008. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/decisions/ cop/?m=cop-09〉. [43] CBD. Decision X/29, Sections 25 and 26; 2010. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/ decisions/cop/?m=cop-10〉. [44] CBD. Decision XI/17, Section 6; 2012. Online: 〈http://www.cbd.int/decisions/ cop/?m=cop-11〉. [45] Weaver P, Johnson D. Biodiversity: think big for marine conservation. Nature 2012;483:399. [46] Ardron J, Gjerde K, Pullen S, Tilot V. Marine spatial planning in the high seas. Mar Policy 2008;32:832–9. [47] Ban NC, Bax NJ, Gjerde KM, Devillers R, Dunn DC, Dunstan PK, et al. Systematic conservation planning: a better recipe for managing the high seas for biodiversity conservation and sustainable use. Conserv Lett, http://dx.doi. org/10.1111/conl.12010. [48] Day J, Dudley N, Hockings M, Holmes G, Laffoley D, Wells S, et al. Guidelines for applying the IUCN protected area management categories to marine protected areas. IUCN; 2012. [49] Freestone D, Johnson D, Ardron J, Killerlain Morrison K, Sebastian Unger. Can existing institutions protect biodiversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction? Experiences from two on-going processes, this issue, http://dx.doi.org/10. 1016/j.marpol.2013.12.007.

Please cite this article as: Dunn DC, et al. The Convention on Biological Diversity's Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas: Origins, development, and current status. Mar. Policy (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2013.12.002i