New Study Presents First-Ever Classification of World’s Coastal Waters

Photo Credit: © Ronny Frimann
Read about Marine Ecoregions of the World.

Source: WWF

DISCOVER > WWF Newsroom

Newsroom > WWF Press Release
System Enables Better Planning, Collaboration and Measurement
For Release: 07/02/2007

WASHINGTON — A new study published today in the journal BioScience presents a first-ever natural classification system of the world’s coastal waters that will help improve priority setting and conservation planning for marine habitats. The report, titled “Marine Ecoregions of the World: a bioregionalization of coast and shelf areas” was written by lead authors Mark Spalding, senior marine scientist at The Nature Conservancy and Helen Fox, marine biologist at World Wildlife Fund, along with coauthors from 10 partner organizations.

The Marine Ecoregions of the World (MEOW) classification system presents scientists, governments and policy-makers with a consistent way to talk about marine habitats and a tool for making more informed decisions, improving collaboration and implementing better conservation on the ground.

“With growing attention to our threatened oceans and coasts, the need for this type of system is enormous” said Spalding. “To date less than one percent of the world’s oceans have been protected, but nations have agreed to ensure widescale protection and sustainable use of our marine resources by 2012. This map will make a great contribution to supporting this task and to tracking progress. It’s critical to have such a scheme to set targets and priorities, to identify gaps and to improve collaboration.”

The authors reviewed more than 230 existing publications, worked with 10 partner organizations and gathered input from expert biogeographers from across the globe to devise a consistent and reliable division of the world’s coastal waters. The system divides the planet’s coastal waters of the world into 12 realms (such as the Tropical Atlantic Ocean), 62 provinces (places like the Mediterranean Sea) and 232 ecoregions (smaller and more homogenous units such as the Northern Gulf of Mexico or the Marshall Islands).

“Ever since terrestrial ecoregions were designated, the need to fill in the gaps for marine and freshwater biomes has been highlighted,” said Fox. “We’re pleased that the MEOW process did just that for coastal zones in such a collaborative way, and we hope it proves valuable for marine priority setting and planning.”

If you liked my post, feel free to subscribe to my rss feeds