 The Natura 2000 ecological MPA network in the European Union included MPAs in the North Atlantic, the Mediterranean Sea and the Baltic Sea.The member states had to define NATURA 2000 areas at sea in their Exclusive Economic Zone.Two assessments, conducted thirty years apart, of three Mediterranean MPAs, demonstrate that proper protection allows commercially valuable and slow-growing red coral (Corallium rubrum) to produce large colonies in shallow water of less than .