Spatial disparities in surf-resource sustainability: Implications for coastal policy and marine education in Taiwan

This study situates global surf sustainability within the Taiwanese context, where recreational surfing has developed since the 1980s and expanded internationally after 2010, yet region-wide assessments of surf-resource sustainability remain limited. Little is known about how sustainability conditions vary across Taiwan’s coastal regions, which sustainability dimensions contribute most strongly to these disparities, and what implications such patterns have for coastal governance and marine education policy. To address this gap, a literature-based Surf Resource Sustainability Index (SRSI) is adapted through a novel integration of remote sensing, GIS, and open socioeconomic datasets, enabling consistent township-scale evaluation beyond data-rich surf sites. The framework incorporates indicator weighting and statistical validation to strengthen the diagnostic interpretation of sustainability differences and domain relationships. By integrating temporal demographic trends with spatial assessments, the framework provides additional contextual evidence for understanding longer-term social capacity and policy-oriented surf-resource management. Correlation analysis shows that social factors are most strongly associated with overall SRSI performance, followed by governance and economic dimensions, while environmental factors exhibit weaker relationships. Spatial analysis further reveals distinct sustainability patterns across domains, while the sustainability profile typology identifies different combinations of domain-level strengths and weaknesses that may occur even among townships with similar overall SRSI levels. Temporal demographic evidence further provides context for interpreting these spatial disparities, suggesting that longer-term demographic trajectories may influence the capacity of coastal communities to maintain social networks, local knowledge, and institutional continuity. These findings highlight the importance of place-based approaches that consider social, economic, environmental, and governance conditions together rather than relying on overall sustainability scores alone. Accordingly, reducing spatial disparities in surf-resource sustainability emerges as a key priority for evidence-based regional marine policy.