The Waitt Institute is a non-profit organization based in Washington, DC. It was founded in 2005 by Ted Waitt (co-founder of Gateway Computers) to foster exploration and discovery. The focus of the Waitt Institute has shifted in recent years, and today its mission is “empowering communities to restore their oceans to full productivity.” To achieve this, the Waitt Institute directs its efforts toward fostering deep collaborations with local governments and communities to create comprehensive ocean zoning and management solutions.
December 23, 2015 — Overfishing, climate change, habitat destruction, and pollution remain major threats to the world’s ocean. But amidst all that there is some seriously good ocean conservation news worth celebrating. So, to continue the tradition started last year with listing 14 Ocean Conservation Wins of 2014, here’s a rundown for 2015 that will hopefully fill you with #OceanOptimism. These wins represent the diligent efforts of organizations and individuals too numerous to list, so let’s just start with a blanket shoutout to all of #TeamOcean for a great year.
#1. Over 2 million km2 of ocean was protected in big new marine reserves. Marine reserves are areas completely closed to fishing, and 2015 saw more ocean protected in a single year than ever before. Chile created Desventuradas Marine Park (297,000 km2), and Easter Island Marine Park 631,000 km2). New Zealand created Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary (620,000 km2), Palau created Palau National Marine Sanctuary (500,000 km2), the UK announced the Pitcairn Island Reserve (833,000 km2), and protected areas are in the works for Patagonia. However, there is a broad consensus that 30% of the ocean should be fully protected in reserves, and these new designations only get us up to 1% – but we’ll take it!
#2. New technology is being developed to combat illegal fishing. Designating all these new reserves means little without enforcement, and we can’t enforce unless we know what’s happening out on the water. One big tech effort launched this year is Global Fishing Watch, a partnership between Skytruth, Google, and Oceana to track fishing vessels and identify illegal fishing. Another similar program is the Pew Charitable Trust’s Virtual Watch Room. These technologies are in prototype phase and need significant improvement before they live up to expectations, but it’s a promising and exciting development.
#3. Illegal fishing boats are being chased down and caught! Sea Shepherd chased a pirate fishing boat on Interpol’s most wanted list for 10,000 miles, until the boat sank (potentially on purpose to drown the evidence of illegal fishing). Another boat was chased for four days, caught, and fined $2 million for illegally fishing in the Phoenix Islands Protected Area. Blackfish and Environmental Justice Foundation have also been stepping up to make sure enforcement happens, but hopefully we can soon rely on law enforcement organizations, not environmental groups, to do this work.
Read the full story from the Waitt Institute at National Geographic