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In the last few decades, a great deal of work has been carried out on the nature of the oceanic circulation around southern Africa. Attempts have been made to determine regional ocean-atmosphere interactions and the effect of changing sea-surface temperature fields on weather and climate. At the same time, the marine biology and ecosystems of coastal waters have been extensively studied. Few studies have been concerned with the possible effects of global change on the physical and biological components of the systems and their linkages in the regional earth system of the subcontinent. In this paper, a first attempt is made to integrate past work and synthesize it using a systems approach framework. Attention is focused on the nature of the regional ocean circulations affecting southern Africa. The features of the Agulhas and Benguela systems most likely to be affected by global change are discussed and contrasted. At the same time the links to the marine biological and coastal ecosystems of the east and west coasts are explored and the inter-dependencies between physical, biogeochemical and ecological components of regional ocean systems and their anthropogenic modulation are considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Protected and conserved areas (PCAs) are key ecosystem management tools for conserving biodiversity and sustaining ecosystem services and social cobenefits. As countries adopt a 30% target for protection of land and sea under the Global Biodiversity Framework of the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity, a critical question emerging is, which 30%? A risk-based answer to this question is that the 30% that returns the greatest reductions in risks of species extinction and ecosystem collapse should be protected. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List protocols provide practical methods for assessing these risks. All species, including humans, depend on the integrity of ecosystems for their well-being and survival. Africa is strategically important for ecosystem management due to convergence of high ecosystem diversity, intense pressures, and high levels of human dependency on nature. We reviewed the outcomes (e.g., applications of ecosystem red-list assessments to protected-area design, conservation planning, and management) of a symposium at the inaugural African Protected Areas Congress convened to discuss roles of the IUCN Red List of Ecosystems in the design and management of PCAs. Recent progress was made in ecosystem assessment, with 920 ecosystem types assessed against the IUCN Red List criteria across 21 countries. Although these ecosystems spanned a diversity of environments across the continent, the greatest thematic gaps were for freshwater, marine, and subterranean realms, and large geographic gaps existed in North Africa and parts of West and East Africa. Assessment projects were implemented by a diverse community of government agencies, nongovernmental organizations, and researchers. The assessments have influenced policy and management by informing extensions to and management of formal protected area networks supporting decision-making for sustainable development, and informing ecosystem conservation and threat abatement within boundaries of PCAs and in surrounding landscapes and seascapes. We recommend further integration of risk assessments in environmental policy and enhanced investment in ecosystem red-list assessment to fill current gaps., (© 2023 The Authors. Conservation Biology published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Society for Conservation Biology.)