OceansWatch International - another good year in 2012

by Sail-World Cruising on 19 Dec 2012 OceansWatch International is an organisation of cruising sailors who want to make a positive difference to the seas they sail and the island communities they visit. Their activities are usually centred on the islands of the South Pacific and the Atlantic, where they help with sustainable options for the communities and their ocean environment.

Here is an update on their achievements for 2012:

OceansWatch has now been running expeditions in the Pacific for five successive years. That is quite an achievement considering our low budget. We have learnt a lot over this time and we are definitely improving how we do things through our experience in the communities and with our amazing volunteers.

Volunteers have helped us in the OceansWatch office, worked for us from some overseas location, like the teams in the United States, Australia and Europe.

This year we had an amazing team of skilled and enthusiastic volunteers and we made huge progress towards implementing a marine management program for a 30,000 ha area in the Reef Islands in the Solomon Islands. Supporting this project we had members of the Jackson Four aboard Pegasus of Jersey, leading a project to find ground water, an education project and a health project.

For 2013 we are still looking for one more yacht to use all season but we already have the use again of Cat Knapp and Magic Roundabout for expeditions to Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands.

We are also keen to hear from any yachts able to offer support to:

a whale research project in Palau.
a whale research and turtle monitoring project in the Cape Verde Islands.
a reef surveying project in the Cook Islands
a Climate Change rally with Jimmy Cornell

We have already successfully secured some funding for next years project but we are especially looking for individual sponsors to assist Fenualoa resident Lovelyn Moaba.

Lovelyn wishes to train as a marine biologist to build the capacity of the community on Fenualoa so OceansWatch can confidently leave it in the hands of the Conservation committee and Reef Guardians.

For more information about OceansWatch International, or to join, offer a yacht or help in any other capacity, go to the http://www.oceanswatch.org/!OceansWatch_website.