Evaluating management strategies to optimize coral reef ecosystem services: Ecosystem Model Data for Puako, Hawaii

Coral reefs provide a wide range of ecosystem services that are valued differently by different users. Managers are challenged to comprehensively address the full suite of pressures that act simultaneously on these ecosystem state variables and dynamics. We developed a decision-support tool using an ecosystem model, Ecopath with Ecosim, that ranks the efficiency of potential management strategies in evaluating ecological and socio-economic trade-offs based on multiple indicators for coral reef ecosystem services in Puako, Hawaii Island. Our results indicate that current management is inadequate to prevent further declines in coral reef resources and that improved fishery management can mitigate the detrimental effects of expected bleaching-related coral mortalities on the ecosystem services in the next 15 years. The scenario that minimized conflicts between stakeholders was "Only Line Fishing" and to a lesser extent a reduction in fishing effort.

Results include the biomass (tons per square kilometer) for several groups of marine organisms (invertivores, coralivores, planktivores, browsers, grazers, sharks, reef fishes, sea turtles, invertebrates, corals, algae, and plankton) for 2017 and 2032 under the current and alternative management scenarios and the relative performance of the indicators under six management scenarios in 2032 and compared to current management.

The data are available from the Dryad Digital Repository: https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.4sh45