Marine ecosystems

Providing a comprehensive account of marine conservation, this book examines human use and abuse of the world's seas and oceans and their marine life, and the various approaches to management and conservation. Healthy marine ecosystems - the goods and services that they provide - are of vital importance to human wellbeing. There is a pressing need for a global synthesis of marine conservation issues and approaches.

This publication is a result of Blue Solutions’ second Regional Forum on Solutions for Oceans, Coasts and Human Well-being in Latin America and the Wider Caribbean Region. This four-day workshop was held in Cancún, Mexico in April 2015.

Our oceans and coasts are the origin of life on earth, an important food source, and crucial for the global ecological equilibrium,  yet despite their global significance, marine and coastal ecosystems face a wide array of threats. It was in the spirit of making enhanced concerted efforts at the global, regional, national and local levels that the Blue Solutions Initiative was created.

The purpose of this publication is to provide naturalists, resource managers and scientists with a simple guide to identify all species of seagrasses in the Red Sea. Each species is described in detail using photographs of key and diagnostic features. Key features are those that distinguish a particular species from most other species, whereas diagnostic features belong only to that species.

This is the first book to provide assessments of multarget_idecadal changes in resources and environments of the Large Marine Ecosystems (LMEs) of the North Atlantic. Using the case study method, researchers examine the forces driving the changes and actions underway aimed at turning the corner from declining trends in biomass yields, toward recovery of depleted species populations and improvements in ecosystem integrity.

The Great Barrier Reef outlook report 2014 provides an overview of the current condition, use, factors influencing the condition, management effectiveness, resilience, risks to its future and likely outlook. For the first time, the report also specifically considers the Region's heritage values, including Indigenous heritage, historic heritage and the area's world heritage values.