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Climate change is expected to profoundly affect key food production sectors, including fisheries and agriculture. However, the potential impacts of climate change on these sectors are rarely considered jointly, especially below national scales, which can mask substantial variability in how communities will be affected. Here, we combine socioeconomic surveys of 3,008 households and intersectoral multi-model simulation outputs to conduct a sub-national analysis of the potential impacts of climate change on fisheries and agriculture in 72 coastal communities across five Indo-Pacific countries (Indonesia, Madagascar, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, and Tanzania). Our study reveals three key findings: First, overall potential losses to fisheries are higher than potential losses to agriculture. Second, while most locations (> 2/3) will experience potential losses to both fisheries and agriculture simultaneously, climate change mitigation could reduce the proportion of places facing that double burden. Third, potential impacts are more likely in communities with lower socioeconomic status., (© 2022. The Author(s).)

Cumulative impact assessments can inform ecosystem-based management by mapping human pressures and assessing their intensity on ecosystem components. However, its use to inform local management is scarce, largely due to the need for fine-grained spatial data representing ecosystem threats that can assess impacts at a local scale. Here, we applied the cumulative impact assessment framework to Moorea's coral reef, French Polynesia to inform the ongoing revision of the island-wide marine spatial management plan. We combined high spatial resolution data on 11 local anthropogenic pressures and four ecological components with expert vulnerability assessments. Results revealed that the entire reef is impacted by at least four pressures: coral reef fisheries, agriculture, land use change and urbanization. These activities together contribute to 87% of the overall cumulative impact. Most importantly, land-based activities contribute to more than half (52%) of the overall impact. Other high-impact activities, such as reef-based tourism, remain very localized and contribute little to the overall human impact. These findings show that by focusing solely on reef-based activities, the current management plan misses critical sources of impact. Not considering land-based activities in the management may lead to decisions that could fail to significantly lower cumulative human impact on the reef. This study demonstrates how operationalizing the cumulative human impact framework at a local scale can help managers identify key leverage points likely to yield improved ecological outcomes., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Managing human use of ecosystems in an era of rapid environmental change requires an understanding of diverse stakeholders' behaviors and perceptions to enable effective prioritization of actions to mitigate multiple threats. Specifically, research examining how threat perceptions are shared or diverge among stakeholder groups and how these can evolve through time is increasingly important. We investigated environmental threat perceptions related to Australia's Great Barrier Reef and explored their associations before and after consecutive years of mass coral bleaching. We used data from surveys of commercial fishers, tourism operators, and coastal residents (n = 5254) conducted in 2013 and 2017. Threats perceived as most serious differed substantially among groups before bleaching but were strongly aligned after bleaching. Climate change became the most frequently reported threat by all stakeholder groups following the coral bleaching events, and perceptions of fishing and poor water quality as threats also ranked high. Within each of the 3 stakeholder groups, fishers, tourism operators, and coastal residents, the prioritization of these 3 threats tended to diverge in 2013, but convergence occurred after bleaching. These results indicate an emergence of areas of agreement both within and across stakeholder groups. Changes in perceptions were likely influenced by high-profile environmental-disturbance events and media representations of threats. Our results provide insights into the plasticity of environmental-threat perceptions and highlight how their convergence in response to major events may create new opportunities for strategic public engagement and increasing support for management., (© 2020 Society for Conservation Biology.)

Nutrient pollution is altering coastal ecosystems worldwide. On coral reefs, excess nutrients can favor the production of algae at the expense of reef-building corals, yet the role of nutrients in driving community changes such as shifts from coral to macroalgae is not well understood. Here we investigate the potential role of anthropogenic nutrient loading in driving recent coral-to-macroalgae phase shifts on reefs in the lagoons surrounding the Pacific island of Moorea, French Polynesia. We use nitrogen (N) tissue content and stable isotopes (δ 15 N) in an abundant macroalga (Turbinaria ornata) together with empirical models of nutrient discharge to describe spatial and temporal patterns of nutrient enrichment in the lagoons. We then employ time series data to test whether recent increases in macroalgae are associated with nutrients. Our results revealed that patterns of N enrichment were linked to several factors, including rainfall, wave-driven circulation, and distance from anthropogenic nutrient sources, especially human sewage. Reefs near large watersheds, where inputs of N from sewage and agriculture are high, have been consistently enriched in N for at least the last decade. In many of these areas, corals have decreased and macroalgae have increased, while reefs with lower levels of N input have maintained high cover of coral and low cover of macroalgae. Importantly, these patchy phase shifts to macroalgae have occurred despite substantial island-wide increases in the density and biomass of herbivorous fishes over the time period. Together, these results indicate that nutrient loading may be an important driver of coral-to-macroalgae phase shifts in the lagoons of Moorea even though the reefs harbor an abundant and diverse herbivore assemblage. These results emphasize the important role that bottom-up factors can play in driving coral-to-macroalgae phase shifts and underscore the critical importance of watershed management for reducing inputs of nutrients and other land-based pollutants to coral reef ecosystems., (© 2020 by the Ecological Society of America.)

Aesthetic values are a key driver of tourist and recreational visitation to natural areas and are listed among the selection criteria for World Heritage properties. However, assessment and monitoring of aesthetic values in natural areas, and coral reefs in particular, have proven to be challenging. In our study we explored the value and limitations of a rapid assessment approach involving non-expert ratings of aesthetic beauty as a potential tool for long-term monitoring of aesthetic values in the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area, Australia. We investigated the sensitivity of a rating scale for detecting change and sampling requirements for monitoring, as well as observer biases, using an online survey of 1417 Australians in which respondents rated the aesthetic beauty of 181 coral reef images on a ten-point scale. Our results show average aesthetic rating scores ranged from 4.35 to 8.34 on a scale from 1 (ugly) to 10 (beautiful), with potential to detect differences of statistical significance within one point, indicating sufficient sensitivity to change for monitoring purposes. We found that a sample size of c.100 ratings per image provided a reasonable balance between cost (i.e. sample size) and accuracy (i.e. error). Older respondents (>65 years) with higher levels of coral reef visitation, experience and interest were more likely to give extreme ratings, however, there was no apparent predictor for this bias to be positive or negative (high or low ratings). Based on these results we provide recommendations to assist coral reef managers in their use and interpretation of non-expert aesthetic ratings in coral reef monitoring., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are effective resource management and conservation measures, but their success is often hindered by non-compliant activities such as poaching. Understanding the risk factors and spatial patterns of poaching is therefore crucial for efficient law enforcement. Here, we conducted explanatory and predictive modelling of poaching from recreational fishers within no-take zones of Australia's Great Barrier Reef Marine Park (GBRMP) using Boosted Regression Trees (BRT). Combining patrol effort data, observed distribution of reported incidents, and spatially-explicit environmental and human risk factors, we modeled the occurrence probability of poaching incidents and mapped poaching risk at fine-scale. Our results: (i) show that fishing attractiveness, accessibility and fishing capacity play a major role in shaping the spatial patterns of poaching; (ii) revealed key interactions among these factors as well as tipping points beyond which poaching risk increased or decreased markedly; and (iii) highlight gaps in patrol effort that could be filled for improved resource allocation. The approach developed through this study provide a novel way to quantify the relative influence of multiple interacting factors in shaping poaching risk, and hold promises for replication across a broad range of marine or terrestrial settings., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Climate change can alter conditions that sustain food production and availability, with cascading consequences for food security and global economies. Here, we evaluate the vulnerability of societies to the simultaneous impacts of climate change on agriculture and marine fisheries at a global scale. Under a "business-as-usual" emission scenario, ~90% of the world's population-most of whom live in the most sensitive and least developed countries-are projected to be exposed to losses of food production in both sectors, while less than 3% would live in regions experiencing simultaneous productivity gains by 2100. Under a strong mitigation scenario comparable to achieving the Paris Agreement, most countries-including the most vulnerable and many of the largest CO 2 producers-would experience concomitant net gains in agriculture and fisheries production. Reducing societies' vulnerability to future climate impacts requires prompt mitigation actions led by major CO 2 emitters coupled with strategic adaptation within and across sectors., (Copyright © 2019 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial License 4.0 (CC BY-NC).)

Marine protected areas (MPAs) represent the main tool for halting the loss of marine biodiversity. However, there is increasing evidence concerning their limited capacity to reduce or eliminate some threats even within their own boundaries. Here, we analysed a Europe-wide dataset comprising 31,579 threats recorded in 1692 sites of the European Union's Natura 2000 conservation network. Focusing specifically on threats related to marine species and habitats, we found that fishing and outdoor activities were the most widespread threats reported within MPA boundaries, although some spatial heterogeneity in the distribution of threats was apparent. Our results clearly demonstrate the need to reconsider current management plans, standardise monitoring approaches and reporting, refine present threat assessments and improve knowledge of their spatial patterns within and outside MPAs in order to improve conservation capacity and outcomes., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

An overarching challenge of natural resource management and biodiversity conservation is that relationships between people and nature are difficult to integrate into tools that can effectively guide decision making. Social-ecological vulnerability offers a valuable framework for identifying and understanding important social-ecological linkages, and the implications of dependencies and other feedback loops in the system. Unfortunately, its implementation at local scales has hitherto been limited due at least in part to the lack of operational tools for spatial representation of social-ecological vulnerability. We developed a method to map social-ecological vulnerability based on information on human-nature dependencies and ecosystem services at local scales. We applied our method to the small-scale fishery of Moorea, French Polynesia, by combining spatially explicit indicators of exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity of both the resource (i.e., vulnerability of reef fish assemblages to fishing) and resource users (i.e., vulnerability of fishing households to the loss of fishing opportunity). Our results revealed that both social and ecological vulnerabilities varied considerably through space and highlighted areas where sources of vulnerability were high for both social and ecological subsystems (i.e., social-ecological vulnerability hotspots) and thus of high priority for management intervention. Our approach can be used to inform decisions about where biodiversity conservation strategies are likely to be more effective and how social impacts from policy decisions can be minimized. It provides a new perspective on human-nature linkages that can help guide sustainability management at local scales; delivers insights distinct from those provided by emphasis on a single vulnerability component (e.g., exposure); and demonstrates the feasibility and value of operationalizing the social-ecological vulnerability framework for policy, planning, and participatory management decisions., (© 2017 Society for Conservation Biology.)

Mapping the spatial allocation of fishing effort while including key stakeholders in the decision making process is essential for effective fisheries management but is difficult to implement in complex small-scale fisheries that are diffuse, informal and multifaceted. Here we present a standardized but flexible approach that combines participatory mapping approaches (fishers' spatial preference for fishing grounds, or fishing suitability) with socioeconomic approaches (spatial extrapolation of social surrogates, or fishing capacity) to generate a comprehensive map of predicted fishing effort. Using a real world case study, in Moorea, French Polynesia, we showed that high predicted fishing effort is not simply located in front of, or close to, main fishing villages with high dependence on marine resources; it also occurs where resource dependency is moderate and generally in near-shore areas and reef passages. The integrated approach we developed can contribute to addressing the recurrent lack of fishing effort spatial data through key stakeholders' (i.e., resource users) participation. It can be tailored to a wide range of social, ecological and data availability contexts, and should help improve place-based management of natural resources.

The aim of the present study was to determine (1) the extent of levocetirizine binding to human blood cells, plasma and individual plasma proteins; (2) the parameters for levocetirizine binding to individual plasma proteins both at their physiological concentrations and, for human serum albumin (HSA), at a lower saturating concentration; and (3) to simulate levocetirizine distribution in human blood using the information obtained at physiological haematocrit (H) for blood cells and at physiological concentrations for individual plasma proteins. The nature of the main binding sites of HSA, i.e. site I (warfarin) and site II (diazepam), preferentially involved in levocetirizine binding was also investigated. Over the range of therapeutic concentrations and multiples thereof, levocetirizine is extensively bound to blood components, the free fraction remaining constant (6.45%) and the fraction bound to blood cells and to plasma proteins accounting for 27.43 and 66.11%, respectively. The binding of levocetirizine to HSA in the presence of physiological concentrations of non-esterified fatty acids (NEFAs) is the main interaction of levocetirizine in blood (50.68% of overall blood binding). This interaction is fatty acid sensitive, with decreasing concentrations of NEFA increasing the amount of bound drug and vice versa. Levocetirizine is also bound to alpha1-acid-glycoprotein and high-density lipoproteins (5.17 and 6.89% of overall blood binding, respectively). The displacement of levocetirizine by diazepam is consistent with the binding of this drug to HSA at site II, as diazepam is a specific marker for this site. The binding of levocetirizine to HSA at site II being characterized by a low association constant, other drugs sharing the same site with high association constants cannot displace levocetirizine except at very high plasma concentrations. In any case, at therapeutic concentrations of levocetirizine and at physiological protein concentrations, the observation that none of the levocetirizine binding proteins is saturated suggests that very little or no variation of the free fraction will occur although a different distribution of its bound forms is possible.