No-fishing areas established around Tonga are showing they are helping coral reef ecosystems to recover, according to the Special Management Area Report 2020, compiled by the Ministry of Fisheries in partnership with Australia's James Cook University over four years.

The report [2] looked at the effectiveness of Special Management Areas (SMAs) programs managed by communities which aims to revive the health and status of coastal fisheries resources in Tonga. Reefs were surveyed at over 350 sites throughout 49 SMAs across Tongatapu, Ha’apai, and Vava’u, from 2016 to 2019.

In many places, coral reefs had been damaged by cyclones, coral bleaching, pollution and overfishing.

Eight of the oldest Special Management Areas in Tonga were assessed, including no-take Fish Habitat Reserves (FHRs) within each SMA, where no fishing is allowed. 

It showed around half of the Fish Habitat Reserves were recovering with an abundance of fish and diversity, while there was not much improvement was found within the SMAs, where the communities managing them are allowed to fish. 

The two best performing FHRs were at ‘Atata and Nomuka where adult food fish and reef fish diversity had recovered.

The poorest performing FHRs were at ‘Eueiki, Ha’afeva, and O’ua showing little evidence of any recovery.

Vava'u worst

According to the report, coral reefs and reef fish fishery in Vava'u is in noticeably worse condition than elsewhere in the country, with extensive evidence of damage to reefs from coral bleaching in Vava'u and northern Ha'apai. There is also extensive evidence of cyclone damage in southern Vava'u and northern Ha'apai.

The report also highlighted that poor water quality appeared to have damaged many of the reefs around the lagoonal areas in Tongatapu and Vava’u.

The new SMA sites that were established after 2013/14 were only assessed on the current status of their ecosystems, as at the time of surveying, they were considered all too young to show any recovery.

Typical recovery times of coral reef fish can take at least three years for early signs of recovery and over 20 years for full recovery.

The report also acknowledged that some threats cannot be solely addressed by SMAs such as climate change, which requires large-scale changes in international behaviour.

Recommendations

Several recommendations for the FHRs not recovering well includes making them larger in size, and closed permanently to damaging activities, as it can take many years for recovery to build up and only days to reduce recovery to its pre-existing state.

The FHRs should also be set up over the best quality habitat within each SMA and the enforcement of regulations needs to be improved.

Recommendations for SMAs includes additional regulations to reduce fishing may be required such as size and catch limited, or limit certain practices such as night time spearfishing. Management should also be improved beyond SMAs.

Degazetting SMAs was not recommended as it has taken many years for the SMA program to develop into what it is today.

And the water quality around the lagoons in Vava’u and Tongatapu should be seriously addressed.

An ongoing national monitoring program should be implemented to clearly demonstrate whether the program is achieveing its goals.

Positive results

Overall, the report said Tongan communities and the Ministry of Fisheries should be proud of the positive results of the SMA program, as it demonstrates for the first time fish stocks are improving.

Lead author, Patrick Smallhorn-West from James Cook University and a National Geographic Explorer said the report is written for anyone who is interested in the SMA program, or in the health of Tonga’s oceans.

“It provides lots of information that will be useful, including maps and photos. It also includes infographics on the rules of the SMA program and how SMAs work. Most importantly, the reports for each of the 49 SMA communities are available in both Tongan and English.”

“We hope that this information will be useful for Tonga in the years to come”.

The SMA program was introduced in 2006 and there are now over 50 SMAs in the country.