Contributed Paper Efficient and equitable design of marine protected areas in Fiji through inclusion of stakeholder-specific objectives in conservation planning Georgina G. Gurney, ∗ ¶ Robert L. Pressey, ∗ Natalie C. Ban,† Jorge G. ´ Alvarez-Romero, ∗ Stacy Jupiter,‡ and Vanessa M. Adams§ ∗ Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland 4811, Australia †School of Environmental Studies, University of Victoria, P.O. Box 3060 STN CSC, Victoria BC V8W 3R4, Canada ‡Wildlife Conservation Society Fiji Country Program, 11 Ma’afu Street, Suva, Fiji §Research Institute for the Environment and Livelihoods, Charles Darwin University, Darwin NT 0909, Australia Abstract: The efficacy of protected areas varies, partly because socioeconomic factors are not sufficiently considered in planning and management. Although integrating socioeconomic factors into systematic con- servation planning is increasingly advocated, research is needed to progress from recognition of these factors to incorporating them effectively in spatial prioritization of protected areas. We evaluated 2 key aspects of incorporating socioeconomic factors into spatial prioritization: treatment of socioeconomic factors as costs or objectives and treatment of stakeholders as a single group or multiple groups. Using as a case study the design of a system of no-take marine protected areas (MPAs) in Kubulau, Fiji, we assessed how these aspects affected the configuration of no-take MPAs in terms of trade-offs between biodiversity objectives, fisheries objectives, and equity in catch losses among fisher stakeholder groups. The achievement of fisheries objectives and equity tended to trade-off concavely with increasing biodiversity objectives, indicating that it is possible to achieve low to mid-range biodiversity objectives with relatively small losses to fisheries and equity. Importantly, the extent of trade-offs depended on the method used to incorporate socioeconomic data and was least severe when objectives were set for each fisher stakeholder group explicitly. We found that using different methods to incorporate socioeconomic factors that require similar data and expertise can result in plans with very different impacts on local stakeholders. Keywords: fisheries, marine reserve design, marine spatial planning, MPA, opportunity costs, social equity, systematic conservation planning, marine protected area Dise˜ no Eficiente y Equitativo de ´ Areas Marinas Protegidas en Fiji por medio de la Inclusi´ on de Metas Espec´ ıficas de Actores en Planeaci´ on para la Conservaci´ on Resumen: La efectividad de las ´ areas protegidas var´ ıa en parte porque los factores socioecon´ omicos no se consideran suficientemente en la planeaci´ on y en el manejo. Aunque cada vez m´ as se propone integrar los factores socioecon´ omicos a la planeaci´ on para la conservaci´ on, se requiere m´ as investigaci´ on para progresar del reconocimiento de estos factores a la incorporaci´ on efectiva de los mismos en la priorizaci´ on espacial de las ´ areas protegidas. Evaluamos dos aspectos claves de la incorporaci´ on de los factores socioecon´ omicos a la priorizaci´ on espacial: el tratamiento de los factores socioecon´ omicos como costos o como metas y el tratamiento de los actores interesados como un grupo ´ unico o como grupos m´ ultiples. Con el dise˜ no de un sistema de ´ areas marinas protegidas (AMP) de no-extracci´ on en Kubulau, Fiji como estudio de caso, evaluamos c´ omo estos aspectos afectaron la configuraci´ on de las AMP de no-extracci´ on en t´ erminos de las compensaciones entre las metas de conservaci´ on de la biodiversidad, las metas de las pesquer´ ıas y la equidad ¶email georgina.gurney@gmail.com Paper submitted August 3, 2014; revised manuscript accepted January 2, 2015. 1 Conservation Biology, Volume 00, No. 0, 1–12 C  2015 Society for Conservation Biology DOI: 10.1111/cobi.12514