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Marine Ecoregional Assessments (MERAs)
Clickable map:  Completed MERA Completed MERA available for download    Pending MERA MERA pending
 

Completed Marine Ecoregional Assessments

Completed ecoregional assessment documents are available by clicking on the map above or on ConserveOnline, our interactive information exchange.

Learn more


How Ecoregional Assessments Work

Identifying Targets:
In each region, data is used to identify targets, or the species and ecosystems that fully represent the region's marine and coastal biological diversity.

Establishing Goals:
For each target, goals are set to ensure that conservation and management protect a full representation of the marine environment.

Analyzing Threats:
Information on threats to species and ecosystems is examined to identify where actions are urgently needed and where the threats can be abated.

Setting Priorities:
Marine ecoregional assessments identify a portfolio of priority sites for marine conservation. The information and process can be tailored to balance socio-economic concerns from multiple stakeholders.


We collaborate with stakeholders around the world, including scientific experts, communities and governments, to develop marine assessments that:

  • Provide a comprehensive set of data and decision support tools as a foundation for partners to develop better ecosystem-based management. 
  • Identify a portfolio of priority sites for natural resource management, and a full range of conservation strategies, that are evaluated based on ecological, social, economic and political needs of individual places.
  • Help develop regional strategies for ensuring better integration of management activities across entire ecosystems. 
  • Guide a unique set of region-wide, place-based conservation actions.

Planning with Partners

Using a science-based approach, The Nature Conservancy works with partners to collect and share information about the status of and threats to marine biodiversity throughout a region, enabling the actions of each organization to be informed by the efforts of others. This cooperative approach to marine ecoregional assessment helps guide the Conservancy?s innovative ?in-the-water? conservation strategies, such as habitat restoration, marine protected area networks as well as new approaches like leasing and ownership of marine lands.

Our partners in government agencies and regional governing bodies have employed our marine ecoregional assessments to guide their actions.  By making our process transparent and our planning resources distributable we enable partners to adapt and adopt objective decision making framework. 

In several U.S. states the Conservancy has provided our species and habitat lists and supported the distribution of information for State Wildlife plans.  Internationally, the marine ecoregional assessment process is being adapted for science-based planning in response to the Convention on Biological Diversity. We also work with Regional Fisheries Management Councils to support regional resource management decision-making.


Indonesia (Bandas/Flores Seas)Palau Tropical ForestsCarolines Tropical Moist Forest (Micronesia)USA?Arctic; Bering Sea (.pdf, 1.3 MB)Arctic?YukonUSA?Alaska; Bristol Bay (.pdf, 1.3 MB)Canada?Canadian Northwest (.pdf, 25 MB)USA?Pacific Northwest; Integrated Coastal (.pdf, 11 MB)Northern CaliforniaSouthern CaliforniaGulf of California & Near Shore PacificUSA?Northern Gulf of Mexico (.pdf, 2.0 MB)USA?Florida (.pdf, 25 MB)USA?South East Atlantic Coast (.pdf, 22 MB)Northwest Atlantic CoastSolomon ArchipelagoBismark SeaUSA?Alaska; Cook Inlet (.pdf, 1.3 MB)USA?Puget Sound (.pdf, 23 MB)Ecuador?Equatorial Pacific (.pdf, 1.46 MB, En Espa?ol)Chile & Peru MarineGreater CaribbeanSouthern CaribbeanTropical Eastern PacificMesoamerican Reef