Building environmental stewardship to address compliance gaps in the SINIS Marine Protected Area, Sardinia.

This interdisciplinary pilot project that brings together the University of Bristol Law School and the National Research Council of Oristano (Sardinia) is divided in two phases, the first consisting in primary research and the second in impact activities. During the primary research (2014), funded by RITMARE, the project team investigated the conservation status of the Sinis MPA and carried out semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders at the local and regional level as well as doctrinal analysis to find out perceptions, understandings and levels of implementation of marine conservation law and policy in the Sinis MPA. The findings pointed out that the Sinis MPA is not achieving its conservation objectives, primarily due to compliance gaps with the law. Using regulation theory, the causes for such compliance gaps, embodied by regulators' inefficiency and sea-users' lack of environmental stewardship, have been investigated and discussed.

The second phase of the project, funded by the ESRC Impact Acceleration Account, is a first attempt to address the challenges identified in the first phase. It consists in a series of impact activities with the aim to both give policy recommendations to local and regional regulators and carry out education activities with the local high school (Liceo Scientifico di Oristano) and the public to improve environmental awareness and knowledge of marine conservation law and biology in the area. The project team will test these activities in the Sinis and if succesful, apply them to other MPAs in Italy.