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The establishment of protected areas is an efficient way to ensure nature conservation, but these areas are frequently managed without objective criteria for resource allocation, what often results in insufficient funding. In order to contribute to the management of marine protected areas in Brazil, this paper aims to estimate use and non-use values of Parque Estadual Marinho da Pedra da Risca do Meio, located in Ceará state, through the contingent valuation method. One hundred and five (105) interviews were conducted with residents of Fortaleza, Ceará, and the influence of sociological variables (summarized by descriptive statistics) on the Willingness To Pay (WTP) for the maintenance of the Park was studied through linear models. Total willingness to pay was calculated by multiplying WTP by the involved population. On average, respondents were willing to expend R$21.50 / month for the maintenance of the Park, an amount that was higher in the case of users and people of higher incomes. Considering only users, the use value amounts to R$964.080 / year. These results highlight the importance of this protected area and emphasize the need of new financing strategies for its maintenance. Increased incentives for visitation, collection of fees and the payment for environmental services seem to be well-accepted financing mechanisms, which are equally applicable to other Brazilian marine protected areas, and therefore can contribute to the conservation of the country's coastal zone.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of microwave and microwave combined with vacuum on the nutritional and sensory characteristics of blackberry jelly, in order to verify if they are actually more viable methods of processing when compared to the traditional process in open pan. Ot was verified that the processing methods studied did not influence the sensory characteristics of the obtained jelly, however, it was observed that the microwave processing, in particular low power microwave without vacuum, promotes smaller nutritional losses in the blackberry jelly. The jellies processed in low-power microwave without vacuum stood out from the others presenting the highest antioxidant activity by DPPH (2095.19 g f.w./g of DPPH) and ABTS method (21.81 μM trolox/g), the highest total phenolic content (504.58 mg GAE/100 g) and one of the highest ascorbic acid content (33.72 mg ascorbic acid/100 g). The jelly processed in high-power microwave without vacuum, stood out to have the highest antioxidant activity by the beta-carotene method (84.20% protection). On relation to the anthocyanins content, the jellies processed by vacuum microwave (low and high power) were highlighted because they presented the highest levels (16.25 and 15.03 mg of cyanidin equivalent 3 glucoside/100g, respectively).

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