Planning for Marine Protected Areas

1.2 The West Coast Marine Protection Forum

The West Coast Marine Protection Forum is a special planning group that has been set up to work with the Department of Conservation, the Ministry of Fisheries and the wider West Coast Tai Poutini community. The Forum was set up by the Conservator, Department of Conservation, West Coast Tai Poutini Conservancy to provide advice on options for integrated marine protection. The job of the Forum is to use the MPA Policy tools to recommend the best overall protection of marine and coastal habitats and ecosystems that are representative, outstanding or rare within the West Coast region.

The Forum is made up of local people, tangata whenua and others who have an interest in the West Coast’s marine and coastal environment.

The Forum aims to:

• Understand the social, biological, recreational and commercial characteristics and dynamics of the West Coast marine and coastal environment;
• Facilitate opportunities for community, stakeholder and user input into consideration of options for integrated protection of West Coast marine and coastal diversity;
• Identify the habitats and ecosystems of the West Coast marine environment;
• Evaluate options to achieve integrated protection of marine and coastal biodiversity that is representative, outstanding, and rare of the West Coast consistent with MPA policy;
• Apply nationally consistent site selection and protection criteria to identify habitats and ecosystems to recommend as candidates for protection within a national network of Marine Protected Areas;
• Recommend MPA’s that minimise the impacts on existing users, on the marine environment, or on Treaty of Waitangi settlement obligations; and
• Ensure that the public, stakeholders and tangata whenua are informed about the process and able to participate in it.

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