Deep-water corals are slow growing, fragile and vulnerable to the impacts of deep-water fisheries and
the development activities of the offshore industries. In Ireland there is now evidence of major damage
to deep-water corals linked to a recent expansion of the Irish deep-water fishery. This fishery uses trawls
fitted with robust rock hopping gear and employs a high risk fishing technique, which is potentially
very destructive to coral habitats. Consequently resource managers have been exploring the potential of
marine protected areas (MPA) as a tool for the conservation of these coral ecosystems in the North East
Atlantic. MPAs aim to minimise the socio-economic costs associated with closures or other management
restrictions while still achieving the desired conservation objectives. However, the decision to use MPAs
(and thereby restrict fishing) is often taken in the light of uncertainty over the value of the reserved
habitats to the fishing industry. This paper reports on a choice experiment study carried out in Ireland in
early 2007 aimed at partly addressing this uncertainty. The study primarily focused on determining the
economic value held by the Irish public for the conservation of deep-sea corals using several variants of
the concept of MPAs. They have endorsedMPAstrategies that banned trawling in anMPAthat included all
areas where corals are thought to exist with no personal tax imposed, banned trawling in an MPA covering
all known corals with a personal tax imposed of D 1 p.a. and banned all fishing in an MPA covering all
areas where corals are thought to exist with a personal tax imposed of D 1 p.a. In terms of the probabilities
attached to the individual attributes, the most preferred policy options were to ban trawling, protect all
areas where corals are thought to exist, and pay a ring-fenced personal tax of D 1 p.a.