Abstract

Successful coastal management requires an understanding of biophysical and social systems and how they are affected by resource governance. To comprehensively inform an ecosystem approach for managing fisheries and coastal resources in tandem with safeguarding the socioeconomic needs of coastal communities, there is a recognized and growing need to integrate biophysical and social monitoring efforts. This type of coordinated process requires clearly-defined objectives, prioritization of indicators collected, agreement upon best practices to maximize the use and accessibility of collected data, and collaboration throughout the process. In order to inform the prioritization of biophysical and socioeconomic indicators collected in the Pacific Islands, we surveyed marine resource managers and scientists involved in the design and implementation of biophysical or socioeconomic monitoring efforts throughout the region. The responses from 112 participants revealed the relative awareness and perceived importance and usefulness of available indicators, and identified any additional data types considered useful for management. These survey results were further combined with commentary from 55 participants from focus groups to provide recommendations for enhanced integration of biophysical and socioeconomic monitoring. By reviewing indicators collected by monitoring efforts, our study informs the prioritization of indicators for integrated monitoring -- a process that should continue to be iterative in order to maintain the relevancy of data collected in support of adaptive management. Based on the findings, we also provided recommenda-tions to better integrate socioeconomic and biophysical monitoring.

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