Panama´s Coiba National Park (CNP), Cocos Island in Costa Rica and Ecuador's Panama´s Coiba National Park are World Heritage Sites that protect an extensive marine corridor, essential to the health of fisheries in the region and to migrating sharks, whales and other marine life.
For years, the authorities have protected Coiba National Park, the Panamanian segment of the corridor. Smithsonian scientists Hector Guzmán and Juan Maté work together with them to promote conservation in CNP from their base on Ranchería Island (Coibita). Other scientists also further biological inventories and studies in the search for a cure for cancer and tropical diseases.
Together with Edgar Graham of Conservation International, Guzmán is co-author of a recent paper in the journal Global Ecology and Biogeography, "Variation in reef fish and invertebrate communities with level of protection from fishing across the Eastern Tropical Pacific seascape", that confirms the effectiveness of well-protected Marine Protected Areas and concludes that the prevention of overfishing increases the number of large fish, which in turn reduces the number of starfish and sea urchins and helps to conserve coral reefs.
The CNP Management Plan, a collaboration between Panama's National Environmental Authority and the Smithsonian in Panama which is coordinated by Juan Mate, is the result of a participatory process that took place between May 2006 and February 2009, when it was approved by the CNP Board of Directors.
http://www.stri.si.edu/english/about_stri/headline_news/news/article.php?id=1279
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