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GLORES Newsletter
Latest updates on the Global Ocean Refuge System
July 24, 2014
Dear Friend of the Ocean,
Thank you for your continued interest in the Global Ocean Refuge System (GLORES)! We have been busy working on this critical initiative and are pleased to report on some of our recent accomplishments. Please see below for highlights of our activities.
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Actively developing the scientific criteria for GLORES
Marine Conservation Institute founder and Chief Scientist, Dr. Elliott Norse, is currently drafting a white paper on the essential criteria for the Global Ocean Refuge System (GLORES). With the help of marine scientists and conservation advocates, he is identifying sound criteria for location, size, legal protection, management and enforcement to determine whether an area’s marine life will survive in our changing environment.
We will seek input on this preliminary criteria document from our marine science peers in an invitation-only workshop at the 3rd International Marine Conservation Congress (Glasgow, Scotland) in August 2014 and the Pew Marine Fellows meeting (Sausalito, CA) in November 2014 and revise the criteria accordingly.
Future steps include assembling a Criteria Committee of 12-15 renowned marine scientists to help finalize the criteria for Global Ocean Refuge status and validating these criteria with real world protected areas. By engaging highly-respected leaders in the field of marine conservation and biology, we hope to achieve widespread acceptance for the GLORES criteria by the scientific community. The Criteria Committee will further develop the criteria in two intensive meetings: one in early 2015 and the next one approximately 3 months later. Marine Conservation Institute staff will also apply the draft criteria to a diverse set of existing marine protected areas so that committee members can review real-world examples of how the criteria would function.
How does the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument relate to GLORES?
Creating strong protection for marine areas is what GLORES is all about! If you missed the flurry of activity on Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument (PRIMNM), here is a brief overview. On June 17, President Obama announced his plans to expand the monument to become the largest strongly protected area in the world. Marine Conservation Institute played a major behind-the-scenes role in making this happen. Part of that was getting marine scientists to (digitally) sign a letter to the President about the importance of marine reserves. That scientist letter supporting marine reserves now has been signed by almost 500 scientists.
Marine Conservation Institute had an early role in securing protection for this region― from working with President George W. Bush to originally designate the Pacific Remote Islands in 2009 to providing a report on the scientifically compelling case to significantly expand the monument to the Obama administration.
The decision by President Obama is not set in stone yet, but we are continuing to influence the outcome. We have developed a second scientist letter to support the expansion of the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument to encourage the President to follow through on his decision and are actively gathering marine scientist names for that as well.
There was a lot of media coverage about this announcement including in The Washington Post, Associated Press, The Guardian. These and additional media coverage can be found on the “In the News” page of the GLORES Website.
New MPA Campaign Tracker to help track Global Ocean Refuges
In other GLORES-related news, Marine Conservation Institute recently announced a new tool that highlights ongoing marine protected area campaigns, from smaller one-time efforts to larger sweeping initiatives. The tool, MPA Campaign Tracker was created as part of the MPAtlas project. It will eventually be used to track marine protected areas that have been awarded Global Ocean Refuge status. MPAtlas is made possible by generous donor support from the Waitt Foundation, Winslow Foundation, Holland America Line and Arntz Family Foundation.
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Support for GLORES from Travel/Tourism and Ocean Sports Industries
The travel/tourism and ocean sports industries have a lot to gain from healthy, vibrant oceans. A global system of strongly protected marine areas will help people regain the benefits of healthy oceans including fresh seafood, clean beaches and abundant well-paid jobs. A team of people from Marine Conservation Institute are actively working to secure support for GLORES from hotel chains, major airlines, cruise lines, ocean sport outfitters and more. A shout-out to Holland America Line, Un-Cruise Adventures and Wildland Adventures for their early endorsement of GLORES. Please keep checking on the GLORES Partner page for new partners.
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Donor Spotlight: The Tiffany & Co. Foundation
Marine Conservation Institute has received a generous grant from The Tiffany & Co. Foundation to develop a strategic business plan for GLORES. One of our GLORES Priority Projects, the plan will look ahead 15 years with a particular focus on the next 3 years. We greatly appreciate The Tiffany & Co. Foundation’s leadership support for this important project!
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Thank you for your support of GLORES!
If you have read this far, thank you! We invite you to provide donor support for GLORES by going to our Support GLORES page. It is people like you who will help make this important initiative a reality. For our oceans…for us, for future generations.
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SeaStates 2014 and the GLORES Connection
Marine Conservation Institute recently released a second annual report, SeaStates 2014, that reveals that most states and territories are failing to safeguard our nation’s marine life, seafood and coasts. Many coastal US states and territories have established some level of protected areas, but the protection is often weak or temporary. In contrast, no-take marine reserves—marine protected areas that are free from fishing, mining and oil and gas development—are the highest standard. They allow the oceans to recover biodiversity and abundance, and export marine life to surrounding and remote areas. Protection in US waters will also be part of GLORES. And stay tuned for a SeaStates report card for countries around the world.
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Upcoming Events
IMCC3 International Marine Conservation Congress
August 17-24, 2014
Glasgow, Scotland
World Parks Congress
November 12-19, 2014
Sydney, Australia
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