Marine Conservation

As the oldest conservation organisation in East Africa, the East African Wild Life Society (EAWLS) has benefitted from support from FFI. It has been extremely successful in combating rhino and elephant poaching in the past, but was struggling to function by the mid 1990s. FFI has helped to rebuild EAWLS’ conservation capacity and is currently supporting them in the development of a regional conservation plan and focusing on their coastal and marine programme. The overall goal is to conserve biodiversity and improve the livelihoods of coastal communities through the sustainable management of coastal and marine resources in Kenya.

The Ecuadorian government is striving to establish a system of Marine Protected Areas along the coast. FFI is supporting this process together with the national organisation Fundación Futuro Latino Americano and the Ministry of Environment. We are focusing especially on developing innovative participatory governance systems for the emerging protected areas. We are also encouraging sustainable use of economically valuable resources, such as the spiny oyster, which has been a valuable resource since pre-Columbian times but is now seriously depleted. FFI plans to fund a collaboration between Ecuador and similar initiatives in Costa Rica and Nicaragua.

Poachers are a serious threat to leatherback, hawksbill and olive ridley turtles on Nicaragua’s Pacific coast. They illegally harvest the turtle eggs along beaches and kill hawksbills to use their shell for jewellery. FFI has trained over 80 community members in turtle protection and hatchery management and achieved an impressive rise in hatching success on two key beaches. In addition, we have helped communities to find other ways of making a living, such as making handbags from recycled plastic bags, and raised national awareness to reduce demand for turtle eggs. We are maintaining all this work and extending protection to near-shore waters and a third, recently discovered leatherback nesting beach.

Aceh’s marine ecosystems were heavily damaged by the 2004 tsunami. So too were the communities’ fishing fleets. This meant local communities lost their ability to earn income from both fishing and tourism. FFI is helping to rebuild livelihoods by empowering poor families to re-establish sustainable small tourism-related businesses while protecting coastal ecosystems.

FFI is working in partnership with the Burnett Mary Regional Group for Natural Resource Management (BMRG) to enhance the development of conservation in the Burnett Mary Region of south-east Queensland. The region’s stunning Great Sandy Biosphere supports an especially diverse array of species and is an important stop-over for humpback whales. FFI are helping to build the capacity of BMRG to establish sustainable finance mechanisms and to plan a landscape-level strategy. We are also working on innovative projects that aim to increase the involvement of the Indigenous community in the area’s conservation.