Hidden under the ocean’s surface, most of us do not realize that coral reefs represent one of the most diverse ecosystems in the world. They are often referred to as the “rainforests of the oceans.” They support an estimated twenty-five percent of all marine life, play an important role as natural breakwaters, which minimize wave impacts from storms such as cyclones, hurricanes or typhoons, and provide economic benefits through tourism.
They are, however, under increasing threat. With the continual change in environmental conditions, reef survival will be determined by the capacity of corals to adapt to a shifting climate.
According to OneReef Founder Chris LaFranchi, the time is now to deal with the rapidly diminishing coral reef system. Like Rare, OneReef stresses the fact that if communities want to keep their reefs intact they may find it necessary to adopt effective no-take zones and enforce stronger catch limits.
While many communities want to participate and save the resources that they need to survive, the resources are not there. This is where OneReef comes in. By linking investors with local communities, OneReef helps create a secure financing stream that fills financial gaps while bolstering capacity of communities to attract and use additional funding from government and science organization partners.
By finding their bright spot in the Micronesian ecosystem “a strategic place to start because of the abundance of coral reefs, favorable political will, and high degree of willingness by communities to protect, manage, and monitor their reefs,” OneReef has seen a huge potential of what can be the future.
Based in Santa Cruz, California OneReef not has used this model to already protect over 300,000 acres in Micronesia and have their sites set for even greater success. Below, founder Chris LaFranchi answers some questions about what lies in the road ahead for coral reefs and his solution.
Why coral reefs? What role do they play in the vast issues that concern the ocean as of now (i.e.: destructive fishing, global warming, etc)?
Coral reefs provide direct benefits to about 500 million people and support about 25% of marine species. They are clearly in a state of rapid decline induced by over-fishing, sedimentation, pollution, and the effects of climate change. They face a critical period in their history during the next 25-50 years, during which time they will need to adapt to new climatic conditions, or undergo dramatic changes, e.g., ecological “phase” shifts to a different sort of ecosystem, likely dominated by fleshy algae instead of hard corals. What we do in the next 10 years or so will have a huge impact on the capacity for adaptation. So, the time is now to intervene, to act forcefully and on a large scale.
What factors influenced you to decide where to focus your work at? (i.e.: Micronesia)
A traditional chief in Palau read about our work online and then invited us to come to Palau and talk about it. We were then invited to begin work on a long-term conservation agreement with his community, the first of its kind in the Pacific Region. Micronesia is a strategic place for us to start because of the abundance of coral reefs, favorable political will, and high degree of willingness by communities to protect, manage, and monitor their reefs. We could see right away a huge potential to create ‘bright spots’ and to kick-start what we hope will become a leadership role by countries in the region.
What is the relationship with coral reef growth and climate change?
Climate change is the ultimate threat to reefs. We do not really know how reefs will respond since there is no climatic analog in the recent past that mirrors the conditions we expect to see this century. Nothing exists that could tell us how reefs looked under similar conditions. Evidence does strongly suggest that the capacity of reefs to adapt to new climatic conditions is much greater when reefs are not stressed by other factors such as pollution, sedimentation, and over-fishing. Thus, the strategy is to protect as many critical reefs as possible from these stressors and study how they change as our climate shifts, adaptively managing along the way. Coral reefs have existed in their present form for about 200 million years, so I am hopeful that they will adapt without severe changes- if we can remove the other stressors.
How is your campaign different than others’ solutions to the coral reef problem?
We apply a simple model of mutual co-operation that enables Pacific Island communities to do what they already want to do: protect, manage, and monitor their reefs, in a way that leaves them in control. What’s novel about our approach is that we have created a way for such communities to strike a direct partnership with other groups of people that are also committed to protection and management, but who are spatially, economically, and culturally distant. The agreements work because they create a self-reinforcing mechanism that fosters an increasingly beneficial and stable relationship between groups that ordinarily do not have the opportunity to work together and find synergy, and stay together for a long time. Reef interventions require a long-term, stable, adaptive intervention. To be specific, our model gives communities an opportunity to capitalize a dedicated sustainable financing fund, over a period of years, as long as their performance under agreements is maintained and verified. We also invest heavily in local capacity.
What are your solutions and what will it take to make them happen (time, money, etc)?
Our solution is to learn from the first several successful agreements in Palau and Yap as we replicate and scale across the Asia/Pacific Region. Right now, the settings at our sites are simple: big healthy reefs at coral atolls owned by relatively small communities; few if any terrestrial issues to address. To grow and progress, we will need to incorporate partnerships to expand how we work; specifically, we need to thematically expand the reach of our model so we can find success in places with larger human populations and terrestrial issues (greater array of human stressors to address under our agreements). We can then show our venture partners how they can invest successfully under these conditions as well. These developments are necessary conditions for taking our work to a very large scale and contributing to the reversal of chronic coral reef decline.
What are the largest positive developments of One Reef so far?
We have reached a tipping point of sorts in that we have successfully negotiated agreements for two large coral atolls and have 5 additional sites in the pipeline. It took a great deal of work to successfully engage these Pacific Island communities, and design a long-term agreement that they would sign and our venture partners would fund. Bringing these two worlds together to forge a heroic partnership is a huge milestone for us. Community leadership is taking the single greatest step. It represents a huge commitment and strong statement from them indicating that we can do this; we can collaborate with people who reside halfway across the globe from us, and maintain an effective collaboration for many years.
What are the biggest obstacles One Reef faces?
The biggest challenges we face include (i) convincing venture partners to allow use of agreement funding to capitalize sustainable finance funds- and thereby relinquish control to communities, (ii) developing local capacity, especially in remote areas, and (iii) designing and implementing agreements that don’t create the perception of dependency or that a community is acting only to receive agreement benefits. Pacific Islanders we work with value self-sufficiency, independence, and a strong sense of responsibility for the condition of their reefs. Unfortunately, it is difficult under contemporary conditions for many communities to muster the resources they need to fully protect their resources. Imagine industrial-scale fishing operations offshore, some of whom are capable and willing to rapidly poach key species. Not to mention the need to inform adaptive management for climate change with careful monitoring. Exploitation of marine organisms and other sources of human pressures on reefs have become globalized. I believe that our conservation efforts must also become globalized if we are to reverse the decline of coral reef ecosystems.
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