Marine spatial planning

Marine spatial planning is a public process for organizing human activities across marine areas. It coordinates uses such as fishing, shipping, energy production, and conservation across space and time.

Ecosystem-based management: An approach to managing human activities that considers whole ecosystems, their interactions, and ecological limits. It supplies the ecosystem-wide perspective that marine plans use to assess cumulative pressures.
Marine protected area: A geographically defined marine area managed to achieve long-term nature conservation, with rules tailored to its objectives. Protected areas are one spatial conservation measure that a marine plan can coordinate with surrounding uses.
Integrated Coastal Zone Management: A process for coordinating development and environmental management across coastal areas and their land-sea connections. It provided an established integrated approach that marine planning extended farther offshore.
Marine spatial planning and marine protected areas: A comparison of broad marine-use planning with place-based measures primarily intended to conserve nature. Plans coordinate multiple activities across a region; protected areas focus restrictions on selected locations.
Marine zoning: The division of marine space into areas with different permitted or restricted activities. Zones are the spatial rules through which many marine plans allocate uses.
Offshore wind power: Electricity generation using wind turbines installed in marine waters. Plans identify suitable turbine areas while accounting for navigation, fishing, wildlife, and infrastructure.
United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea: An international treaty defining states’ rights and responsibilities in the oceans and legal frameworks for marine activities. Its maritime zones and jurisdictional rules shape where national marine plans can apply.
Sectoral management: The regulation of an activity or industry through institutions and rules focused on that sector. Sector-by-sector decisions can conflict, whereas marine planning seeks to coordinate them spatially.
Cumulative impact assessment: An assessment of the combined effects of multiple pressures on environmental or social systems over time. It reveals how several individually acceptable activities may jointly exceed marine ecosystem limits.
Marine fisheries management: The regulation of fishing activity to sustain fish populations, ecosystems, and fishing livelihoods. Fishing grounds and restrictions must be reconciled with other uses and conservation priorities.

Linked from 16 pages