Knowledge integration in Marine Spatial Planning: A practitioners' view on decision support tools with special focus on Marxan

Modern ecosystem-based forms of marine management such as Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) deal with various complex systems and often with huge amounts of data. Software-based simulative and analytical tools are therefore frequently mentioned in the scientific literature on marine management approaches. But in addition to the evolution of management approaches, the requirements for more integrated tools are also progressing. MSP, for instance, comes with different spatial resolutions, an increased need to consider multiple interdepencies, and increased requirements for validity than most of the previous marine management questions. We reviewed seven well-known Decision Support Tools (DSTs) by asking 59 MSP practitioners from at least 25 countries worldwide about their experience with these tools. The results revealed that, while respondents were mostly positive about the use of DSTs in MSP processes, DSTs are still mainly used in the academic realm and have not yet found their way into everyday MSP practice. There is a broad range of reasons for not using DSTs, including the complexity of these tools, the resources required to operate them, low stakeholder confidence in DST outcomes, and the lack of additional value in using DSTs.