DELHI, Feb 5 (IPS) – Melanie Brown has been fishing for salmon in Bristol Bay, Alaska, for more than 30 years. She is an indigenous fisherwoman and member of the Coordinating Committee of the World Forum of Fisher Peoples. She speaks about the sea with great care and knowledge.
When I was interviewed for IPS op Marine protected areas (MPAs), a global conservation policy introduced by the IUCN in 1999, Brown sounded both hopeful and cautious.
“It’s interesting,” she said. “Where I fish in Bristol Bay, if you follow the river upstream you eventually reach a lake system. Right at the point where the lake meets the river is a national park.”
Brown fish the The Naknek Riverwhich has had a steady salmon run for years.
“I really believe it’s because of that park,” she said. The park, Katmai National Park, was created long before World War II The UN’s 30×30 goal – the global goal to protect 30 percent of land and sea by 2030 – was signed in December 2022. It was first protected after a historic volcanic eruption in 1922 and later became a tourist attraction. Brooks Falls is located in the park, where bears are often seen catching salmon.
Indigenous people are still allowed to fish in parts of the park, but only with special permission. Brown explained how salmon change when they enter fresh water.
“In the ocean they are shiny and silvery. In freshwater they turn red. They look different. They taste different.” Brown continues, “They stop eating as soon as they get into fresh water. All they care about is spawning. Dried salmon is important to us. It’s the way we store food.”
She said this type of protection has worked because it has not wiped out native fisheries. But when it comes to marine protected areas, she has mixed feelings.
“If an MPA prevents people from pursuing their traditional fishing in places where they have always fished, that is wrong,” she said. “That shouldn’t happen unless there is a real overfishing problem.”
Brown believes decisions should be made together with fishing communities.
“You can’t just draw a fenced area on a map and tell people they can’t go there anymore,” she said. “You have to work it out with the regulators and the fishermen.”
Still, Brown knows that MPAs can work if they’re written well. In southeastern Alaska, she said, a marine protected area was created to stop factory trawlers. “Fishing with small boats is still allowed. The large industrial boats are left out, but local fishermen can continue.”
For her, the lesson is simple: conservation and fishing don’t have to be in conflict when communities are involved.
Community Guardianship in Kerala
That idea of community engagement also came up in an interview with Kumar Sahayaraju, a marine researcher at Friends of the sea life (FML), who also hails from a traditional fishing community in Trivandrum, Kerala, and is a diver. He believes that MPAs only make sense if they are shaped by the people who live with the sea.
“It would be good if marine protected areas were created with community involvement,” he told IPS. “That is why there is a push internationally for co-management – a bottom-up approach.”
Sahayaraj spoke about reefs off the coast of Trivandrum – underwater ecosystems that fishing communities have used for generations. “These reefs were part of our traditional fishing grounds,” he said. “They were like a commons.”
But now large mechanized boats and trawler boats have entered these reef areas. “They damage the reefs and catch all the fish,” he said. “These reef fish have supported traditional fishermen for generations.”
Like Brown, Sahayaraju sees MPAs as a possible tool.
“In a situation like this, an MPA could return management to traditional fishermen and put an end to destructive fishing methods,” he said. But he emphasized that protection alone is not enough. “Access, authority and management must remain with the community. That is the only way MPAs can work for people and for the ocean.”
This tension between protection and access is playing out around the world as governments push new conservation solutions to tackle climate change and biodiversity loss. One of the largest is the 30×30 target of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. MPAs are now central to this goal.
Global goals, local realities
Nayana Udayashankar, Senior Program Officer at Dakshin Foundationwho works at the intersection of law, policy and marine protection, explained that in India, marine protected areas are legally established under the Wild Animal Protection Act1972, and future MPAs will follow the amended 2022 Act.
“This law allows for two types of conservation measures,” she said. “One is area-oriented protection, and the other is species-oriented protection.” MPAs, she added, fall under different categories of protected areas under this law. The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) has issued notices to several MPAs across the country, including the Gulf of Mannar National Park off the coast of Tamil Nadu.
But Udayashankar questioned the core logic behind how many MPAs are being designed.
“The fundamental idea of MPAs is often ‘no-take’ and the exclusion of people from certain spaces,” she said. “That approach doesn’t always work for marine conservation.”
According to her, area-specific protection in the sea is particularly difficult.
“Marine life does not stay within fixed boundaries,” she explained. “Fish are constantly moving. You can’t just draw a line or fence off a part of the ocean and expect everything to stay within it.”
She also pointed out broader contradictions in the way conservation is practiced.
“Several studies by organizations such as CMFRI and the Gulf of Mannar Marine Biosphere Reserve Trust have clearly demonstrated the ecological importance of both the Gulf of Mannar and its adjacent areas. Palk Bay” she said. “But at the same time, environmentally damaging activities continue just outside these MPAs.”
Unsustainable fishing practices and other coastal activities, she warned, threaten this rich marine ecosystem and undermine both conservation goals and sustainable development efforts.
Udayashankar emphasized that she is not against conservation.
“A large number of people depend on marine resources for their livelihoods and incomes,” she said. “Sustainable fishing and other nature-based activities must be at the heart of any serious approach to marine conservation.”
She argued that conservation strategies should be site-specific and shaped by the local ecology.
“Most importantly, fishermen must be at the forefront of fisheries and coastal management because they are directly dependent on healthy ecosystems.”
This may require changes to existing laws and policies. She pointed out alternatives such as Locally managed marine areaswhich supports the Dakshin Foundation.
“These offer more flexibility and can meet multiple conservation objectives,” she said.
Udayashankar also highlighted the Fisheries Councils of Kerala among the Kerala Sea Fisheries Regulations Actwhere fishermen participate in the management of local fisheries.
“These initiatives are not perfect,” Udayashankar said, “but they are a step in the right direction.”
IPS UN office report
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