Community attitudes towards marine parks in South Australia

Abstract

Marine protected areas are a common conservation management tool to protect marine ecosystems around the world. It has been found that while technical considerations regarding location and size are important for assessing a marine protected area’s effectiveness, the attitudes that communities hold towards marine protected areas can be equally important. Using seven years of public surveys in South Australia from 2012 to 2019, this study explores what potential differences exist across space and time in community attitudes towards marine parks. Overall, probit regression modelling results indicate that opposition to marine parks in South Australia has fallen over time, and that opposition was highest in regional areas. In addition, familiarity with marine parks and associating parks in general with conservation protection influenced people’s positive attitudes towards marine parks. Sociodemographic characteristics of gender, age and education were also important.