When shorelines, coral reefs, and small islands are involved, tourism can both support and interfere with conservation. When visitation gets out of hand, stewards of these places need guidance. When asked for help, a unique network of researchers, managers, and others – the membership of OCTO – volunteered some responses and examples. Here is what they came up with, summarized by AI and humans, in that order.
A Network of Marine Experts Offers Various Solutions for Setting Tourism Limits
Open Communications for the Ocean (OCTO) is a US-based NGO that connects thousands of ocean professionals to the knowledge and networks they need, empowering conservationists and resource managers to apply best practices worldwide. OCTO’s online communities share practical “how-to” knowledge in response to member questions. (You can learn more about OCTO at the end of this article.)
A member recently asked a question pertinent to marine destination stewardship:
What are examples of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs), coastal regions adjacent to MPAs, and islands that have limited the number of visitors to their area, and how have they determined and implemented those limits?
In response, members of OCTO’s MPA Help community sent in over 40 examples of MPAs, coastal regions, and islands that have limited visitor numbers. Here is a selection:
Hanauma Bay, Hawaii
Based on a 2020 biological carrying capacity study, popular Hanauma Bay closes every Monday and Tuesday to provide the ecosystem with relief from tourism pressure, helping to preserve marine life and coral health. The bay is also closed to fishing. Reports from ongoing monitoring inform management decisions. Read more here.
Manuel Antonio National Park, Costa Rica
The Constitutional Court of Costa Rica recently ordered reduction of daily visitors from 3,000 to 1,120 in this park spanning marine, coastal, and terrestrial ecosystems. The goal is to enhance ecological connectivity and reduce wildlife stress. Park fees support its ongoing management and maintenance. Read more here.
Sipadan Island Park, Malaysia
This marine park off the coast of Sabah, northern Borneo, enforces detailed diving restrictions, requiring advanced certification and limiting participants to two dives daily, between 7:00am to 4:30pm. Each dive site accommodates a maximum of 50 divers per day, with each divemaster restricted to leading no more than four divers simultaneously. Malaysian nationals pay discounted conservation fees compared to international visitors. Read more here.
Port Cros/Porquerolles National Park, France
This Mediterranean marine park regulates visitor frequency and density during peak summer seasons. Rather than simple numerical caps, the park uses a coordinated transportation system to manage visitor flow. The approach has become a case study in effective tourism governance, demonstrating how historic Mediterranean marine ecosystems can remain accessible while preventing ecological degradation. Read more here.
Calanques National Park, France
This park near Marseille requires advance reservations for accessing specific areas, particularly the sensitive coastal inlets popular with tourists. The park addresses overtourism publicly and explicitly, creating public awareness about the relationship between visitation limits and ecological health. Their website directly acknowledges tourism carrying capacity as a central management challenge. Read more here.
Galápagos National Park, Ecuador
In 1998, Galápagos set occupancy limits of 1,660 people on boats and 180 on day cruises. These limits have helped protect the archipelago’s environment, although land-based tourism has soared from 5,000 visitors in 1970 to 276,000 in 2018. All tourists must be accompanied by accredited Naturalist Guides, with no more than 16 passengers per guide at visitor sites. International visitors pay a $100 entrance fee. Read more here.
Fernando de Noronha National Marine Park, Brazil
This remote Brazilian archipelago limits tourist arrivals by air to three commercial flights daily with a maximum 340 passengers. For cruise tourism, the park caps passengers at 750 people, with no more than 350 allowed ashore and 350 permitted to engage in water activities at any one time. If cruise passengers stay overnight, their numbers count against the air arrival limitations. Read more here.
Whitsunday Islands, Great Barrier Reef
The Whitsundays employ a “recreational settings” system where vessel size and group numbers determine which areas visitors can access. This creates graduated zones of impact, with pristine areas limited to smaller vessels and groups. The system designates specific mooring points and no-anchoring areas to protect seafloor habitats, all established through a statutory management plan with detailed guides for both recreational and commercial operators. Read more here.
Shark Reef Marine Reserve, Fiji
Fiji has delegated management of this reserve to a local PADI dive center rather than government authorities. The dive center regulates daily boat entries and maximum diver capacity per vessel. This public-private partnership ensures both environmental protection and sustainable local economic benefits. Read more here.
Sept-Îles Natural Nature Reserve, France
This Brittany seabird sanctuary prohibits landing on six of seven islands, with only one island open to summer tourists. Even there, beach access is restricted to low tide during July and August. Reserve managers conduct daily monitoring, counting boats and tracking activities such as diving, kayaking, and shellfish harvesting. Managers can issue warnings for trespassing, backed up by local police for continued violations. Read more here.
Also:
From a network member: Insights from the Resilient Reefs Initiative’s 2021 Solution Exchange on sustainable tourism: “We ran a whole workshop on this late last year and there’s a great round-up including presentations from our guest speakers here.
About Terminology: During the Resilient Reefs Initiative Solution Exchange the term “carrying capacity” was often discussed in the context of monitoring ecological, social, and economic impacts of tourist numbers in order to improve management. That term often receives criticism because of a historic association with the notion of setting a single, maximum number of tourists at a given site. In reality, such simple limit is at odds with tourism behavior (i.e., not all tourists act the same) and the resilience of the environment to tourism impacts, which also varies depending on such circumstances as location, ecosystem health, season, and resource durability. Nonetheless, the readily understandable purpose behind the term makes it easy for lay people to understand and for many marine managers to use when discussing tourist numbers at reef sites. Carrying capacity may vary with conditions, but sometimes there is no administrative flexibility to employ it effectively.
This article was compiled under the guidance of OCTO’s Chief Knowledge Broker, Sarah Carr.
OCTO’s global online communities – MPA Help , EBM Help, and OceanPlastic List – share “how-to” knowledge in response to member questions to support the planning and management of marine protected areas (MPAs), improving ocean ecosystem management and conservation, and preventing ocean plastic pollution respectively. Collectively these lists have over 55 thousand members worldwide.
Do you have ocean-related questions for OCTO’s communities or for the destination stewardship community? Join the communities here: MPA Help, EBM Help, or OceanPlastic List.