The OceansWatch crew including a yacht skipper, marine biologist and dive master will sail from New Zealand to Port Vila on the island of Efate in Vanuatu. Initially they will receive five days training in Reef Check: a monitoring method. It is important to use a consistent methodology to allow comparison over time and between reefs. The team will also spend some time with the Vanuatu Fisheries and Environment departments and Reef Check Vanuatu to determine any current issues and may give dive training to government employees.

We will then sail to each of the communities identified and to others that may have requested assistance. In each community we anchor nearby and announce ourselves to the local Chief and community leaders. Then we work daily with the reef owners and local stakeholders. We assist them in developing a marine management plan and then implement this and demarcate any Community Conservation Areas. To ensure compliance we train “Reef Guardians” teaching them to monitor the coral reefs both in and outside the protected areas and help with signage and educating the community about sustainability. We hold public meetings with all stakeholders and provide marine education classes in schools.

We also develop relationships with these schools to then partner them with a school in the developed world. This partnering gives the schools in developed countries education about the rest of the world and the students can raise money or be pen-pals. We have previously carried out simple village surveys but are currently studying the SEM-Pacifica system so that we can use more comprehensive socio-economic monitoring surveys to monitor our outcomes and ensure that our work is beneficial to the community in the long term. In addition OceansWatch supports craft and eco-tourism initiatives, works with youth development projects and can assist in many other ways that the communities request.

The crew also connects with other cruising yachts and encourage them to work alongside us and visit the villages that we work with. This is good for the villages as they can sell them crafts and offer ecotourism ventures providing much needed cash to the villages. This is also good for the sailors as it gives them opportunities to give something back to developing countries they are travelling around.