Concerns over the current level of protection afforded
to the Chagos Islands were also high, so on 1 April 2010 the UK established a no-take MPA
around the Chagos Islands, twice the size of Great Britain, prohibiting the extraction of any
living resources within the area. The designation of the MPA coincided nicely with the 2010
General Elections, and was hailed as a ‘demonstration of the UK government’s commitment
to environmental stewardship’, and praised by many groups including the Chagos Conservation Trust, Marine Conservation Society and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.
However, the success of such a large no-take MPA relies solely on the fact that the Chagos Islands are uninhabited and free from human interference. The lack of a permanent community living on the Islands is not a natural phenomenon. Rather, the islands are uninhabited due to the removal of the Chagossians in the recent past.