ORAL - Hernandez (CANCELLED, did not show up)

Mexico assumed the goal to increase marine protected areas by 2012, following CBD programmes of work. In Mexico marine environments conservation had not been considered as much as terrestrial environments. Even though 58 out of 161 NPAs protect marine environments. Therefore, during the last 2 years, we have been conducting an analysis to detect gaps in marine conservation. An expert’s workshop was organized in order to identify the most important sites to protect. Each selected site was selected considering the following criteria: species richness, endemism, endangered and flag species, economic uses and values, sustainable use programs, habitat heterogeneity, environmental services, ecological integrity, presence of important oceanic processes, short and long distance impact on the habitats and general biological relevance of the site. The resulting 105 sites were validated afterwards by workshop participants and other experts. Further spatial analyses were conducted within the framework of North American ecoregions proposed by CEC. However, a more detailed analysis and characterization of the sites were still lacking. Consequently, a new classification with six levels was proposed considering geologic, biogeographic, physiographic, morphologic and environmental criteria. This classification confirmed the proper selection of sites that need monitoring efforts and sustainable management. Being the first regionalization of coastal and oceanic areas in Mexico, represents a big effort that still needs further validation in order to use it for more detailed analysis of NPAs, promotion for delineation of modified and new NPAs and general conservation studies.