California\u27s Coast and Ocean Summary Report, part of California\u27s Fourth Climate Change Assessment

This report synthesizes current scientific understanding about the impacts of climate change on California’s coast and ocean and presents a forward-looking summary of challenges and opportunities for the future. It is one component of California’s Fourth Climate Change Assessment (Fourth Assessment). To prepare this report, the state called upon the California Ocean Protection Council (OPC) and California Ocean Science Trust (OST) to convene an Ocean Protection Council Science Advisory Team (OPC-SAT) working group composed of science and policy leaders. Similar to other components of the Fourth Assessment, the 12-member working group was guided by an Advisory Group of end users and high-level decision-makers. This report is intended to provide accessible scientific information that is relevant for policy and decision-makers, build a foundation for policy to address climate change impacts through adaptation and mitigation, highlight best practices and models for coastal adaptation to climate change along the coast, and inform interested members of the public on the impacts of climate change on California’s coast and ocean waters and potential approaches for adaptation and mitigation. It will also inform the next update of the Safeguarding California plan, a policy document serving as California’s climate adaptation strategy, by presenting a scientific grounding to help focus and prioritize future state adaptation efforts

How Good Science and Stories Can Go Hand-In-Hand

What do you say when you have only a minute to explain to a municipal official why keeping track of the number of bird species found in a park may help make decisions about park management? Talk of significant differences among treatments or testing theory will likely meet with glazed looks. In contrast, sharing the stories of the citizen scientists who have censused the birds year after year makes the information more personal and more salient. Stories bring conservation science to life. When one hears how Trevor Lloyd Evans, indefatigable director of bird banding at Manomet Center for Conservation Sciences, awoke before dawn every morning, rain or shine, and led his team of volunteer banders in their mist‐netting surveys, as he has done every spring and fall for more than 40 years; how spring migrants arrive earlier than they used to; and how magical the day was when volunteers mist‐netted a Golden‐winged Warbler (Vermivora chrysoptera), a species not captured in over a decade, the significance of the issues, the contributions of science, and possible solutions become much clearer (Manomet Center 2012). We can explain, through Trevor's story, how assessments of ecosystem health are informed by long‐term observations and deep knowledge of natural and human history in particular places. Here, however, we focus on the complementary roles stories can play, together with science, in advancing conservation science and practice. We assert that conservation interventions that recognize the synergies between science and storytelling may achieve more substantial biological and social outcomes than those that rely on only one or the other. In our work as conservation scientists, we have observed at least 3 types of synergy between stories and science: stories convey the significance of our science (communication), stories can serve as data (scholarship), and stories illustrate how scientific knowledge can illuminate policy choices (translation). We illustrate these synergies with a story from Cabo Pulmo, a national park in Mexico's Baja California Sur.Keywords: Gulf of California, Conservation science, Ecosystem services, Biodiversit

Weeding through assumptions of livelihood approaches in ICM: Seaweed farming in the Philippines and Indonesia

Seaweed farming is a popular alternative livelihood approach that has been included in Integrated Coastal Management (ICM) projects in many tropical developing countries. Using a comparison of various sites in the southern Philippines and northern Indonesia, this paper examines the assumption that as fishers engage in more lucrative livelihoods, such as seaweed farming, pressure will be reduced on the fisheries. It concludes that in some cases seaweed farming has reduced certain types of fishing activities, but it should not be assumed that seaweed farming alone will result in reduced fishing effort. Appropriately combined with other resource management tools, seaweed farming can contribute to an integrated seascape management approach by providing one component of a diversified household livelihood strategy

Key findings from a multidisciplinary examination of integrated coastal management process sustainability

This article synthesizes findings presented in this theme issue from a multidisciplinary research project on factors influencing integrated coastal management (ICM) process sustainability. The generation of social and environmental benefits that are equitably distributed among constituencies is a key factor in ICM process sustainability. Participatory processes, while challenging to manage and under growing scrutiny, remain the most effective manner to engage broad constituencies and ensure that benefits match expectations. The scaling up of many local initiatives in the Philippines and Indonesia is well underway and warrants ongoing support and monitoring. Attention must be paid to legal and institutional frameworks that support integrative planning on local and national scales. Impartial and rigorous research on ICM is offered as a way to support these changes and to assess future challenges and emerging management models. While frequently a volatile process, the authors conclude by affirming their commitment to ICM as a potent and balanced planning process. © 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved