Community Perspectives Toward a Marine Reserve: A Case Study of San Felipe,Yucatán,México

San Felipe marine reserve, in Yucatán, México, is unique, and particularly suited for a case study because the local community created it without a mandate from higher levels of government. This article presents the results of a survey of local interest groups using the method of paired comparisons and rank correlation analysis, to reveal local judgments about the severity of damages to coastal habitats and the level of impacts of activities that cause the damages. The results show that fishers differ significantly from other interest groups in their rankings of the severity of damages to habitats and of impacting activities. These findings suggest that despite the overlapping interests in protecting the resources and the critical habitats, the different perspectives of local interest groups about the severity of damages must be considered in the management of San Felipe marine reserve.     

Analysis of Coastal Wetland Changes Using the “DPSIR” Model: A Case Study in Xiamen,China

Over the past several decades, human activities have had significant impacts on coastal wetlands worldwide. Here, using a model of “Drivers-Pressures-State-Impacts-Responses (DPSIR)” and data collected from coastal wetlands in Xiamen, China, we have analyzed temporal changes in regional coastal wetland ecosystem structure and function from 1950 through 2005. The study period was divided into four parts for comparative analysis: pre-1980s, 1980s, 1990s, and 2000 to present. Our results show that anthropogenic drivers of coastal wetland degradation in this region have increased substantially since 1950, and that this is correlated with a decline in coastal wetland function over the same period.