How to ‘flip’ a paper park: Success in the North Sea carries lessons

How to ‘flip’ a paper park: Success in the North Sea carries lessons

Dogger Bank, a sandbank in the North Sea the size of Washington state, was designated a marine protected area more than decade ago to conserve its sensitive seabed habitat. Yet for most of that time, industrial fishing vessels legally dragged damaging gear across the seabed, prompting NGOs to cite it as one of Europe’s emblematic “paper parks,” where the designation of MPA had not led to substantive change. Last year, it finally got some real pr…