Assessment of MPA management: using the analytic hierarchy process to analyze stakeholder preferences for performance indicators in Nha Trang Bay MPA, Vietnam

Abstract

The establishment of the Nha Trang Bay Marine Protected Area (NTB-MPA) in the Southern coastal of Central Vietnam in 2002 focused on two main purposes: to reserve and manage the biodiversity environment within the MPA areas; and, to enhance the local communities’ life-conditions by providing the alternative livelihoods. To assess the efficiency of an MPA management process, it needs the understandings in what extent and how the perception from stakeholders about the goals of the MPA establishment and management process was. Much has regarded such perceptions with the complication. This study provides an example in analyzing the stakeholders’ opinions of the MPA goals through the performance indicators by applying Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). The options from stakeholders were investigated by the mean of a pairwise comparison survey. The results show that by all stakeholders, there was a little homogeneity in weighting the priority of the NTB-MPA objectives in improving the local communities’ livelihood. The objectives of the NTB-MPA management process in preserving the biological resources receive the quite similar opinions from all stakeholders in ranking their priority. The other conclusion is about the failures in enforcing the regulation of “banning trawlers in the water within and around NTB-MPA” together with the great requirements for enhancing the available sources of information about the MPA. The major challenge for NTB-MPA management process was the possible conflicts between the groups of stakeholders, which were more popular than those among individuals from each separate group of stakeholders regarded as within-conflicts. Especially, the within-conflicts appear mostly amongst 2 key stakeholders: fishermen and local households.

Key words: AHP, Multi-criteria analysis, Stakeholder, Performance indicator, NTB-MPA.