Conservation Thread

[sdcfish]

I would like to invite the members of the Reefcheck staff and other groups working hard to improve our industry's sustainability to this forum.

I hope that we can all better communicate together and move forward to improve the situation throughout the Indo-Pacific and abroad.

So, with that.....let's hope this is a fresh beginning to a long a successful change for the better.

Best regards

Eric

 

[Reef Check HQ]

Hi Reefs.org folks,

Eric Cohen, a Reef Check Board member (and we also enjoy taking our daughters horse-back riding on weekends) has suggested that we start a new thread here on reefs.org to let everyone we know what we are doing. I have been really amazed at how much misinformation and speculation has been placed on this site and wonder where people find the time.....?

I have also asked our local staff in the Philippines and Indonesia to make themselves available to give reports from the field and to answer legitimate questions about what we are doing.

To start I will introduce our Chief Fisheries Scienitst, Dr. Domingo Ochavillo, a Cebuano who got his doctorate here in the US and Rex Montebon a coral reef ecologist who did his grad work at University of the Philippines.

Now let me tell you a bit about myself. I am a coral reef ecologist and I have been diving since 1970 and have dived and worked in most parts of the world. I was in the US Peace Corps with the Philippines Bureau of Fisheries from 1979 to 82 and lived in fishing villages all over the country, speak Tagalog and Cebuano. Living on US$60 a month drinking "tuba" with the fishermen for three years is a very good way to understand how local folks think about reef issues. My PhD focused on sedimentation effects on corals in Palawan and I became interested in the intersection of economics and biology and published a paper on logging versus fisheries and tourism that led to the shutdown of the commercial logging industry around El Nido.

Reef Check is a non-profit marine conservation organization that I started in 1997 to track the global status of coral reefs. Since then, RC has expanded its mission into the wider arena of marine conservation. In our peer-reviewed publication published in 1999, we were the first to document the global nature of the coral reef crisis and the fact that overfishing is the major destabilizing factor affecting coral reefs. Each year thousands of volunteer divers and hundreds of teams carry out the only globally standardized monitoring program in the world using the Reef Check method that focuses on human impact indicators. I invite you all to join a team. http://www.reefcheck.org/participate/teams.asp

Reef Check is not an advocacy organization per se, and we are looking for business-friendly solutions to provide incentives to solve the coral reef crisis. Two areas that we are focusing on are tourism and the marine aquarium trade. On the tourism side, we are marketing marine education through a diver certification program and recently launched a RC California focused on rocky reef ecosystems in California. We see the marine aquarium trade as an excellent incentive for conservation of tropical reefs and as a way to educate fishermen about the need for and benefits of a sustainable trade. MAC certification is the model that we are supporting. It is far from perfect but is the best chance we have to accomplish this incredibly complex goal.

Our role is to work with local fishermen to determine CPUE, stock assessment in collection areas and then to design a fisheries management plan including catch limits and a coral reef and fish stock rehabiliation plan for each area. Part of this work includes design of a marine protected area. We have staff of about 14 in the Philippines and half that in Indonesia to carry out this work. All except one are locals. For more info read the latest newsletter. http://www.reefcheck.org/news/newslette ... the%20News

I along with my staff would be happy to answer any reasonable questions about our work. We will ignore posts that make silly statements or accusations that are unprofessional. We are not here to defend the Marine Aquarium Council or other organizations. We also do not react well to libel -- that is purposedly making false statements about someone or an organization with the purpose of trying to damage their reputation.

I will stop there and look forward to the opportunity to discuss reef conservation with the marine aquarium community. BTW I have always owned a home aquarium. Like many of you, our staff are out in the boonies a lot so we may not be able to respond instantly to posts.

Greg

 

[dizzy]

Greg,
Welcome to reefs.org. I'd like to start by asking what your definition of conservation is.
Thanks,
Mitch

 

[Jaime Baquero]

Greg,

Welcome and thanks for taking the time to participate in this forum.

 

[reformmac]

Wecome Gregor and thank you for taking the time to be here.

My first questions are: How much does a MAQTRAC cost annually? and who pays for this? MAC? RC? USAID? MAMTI? or the collectors groups?

 

[bookfish]

Welcome and thank you for participating in our forum.
What's a MAQTRAC?
Thx-Jim

 

[Reef Check HQ]

The question about conservation is a really good one. Obviously that is a word like "sustainable" that everyone will define differently. So I can only give my personal views.

Because my father was a marine biologist who studied sharks, I was thrown in as shark bait at an early age for some of his experiments on chemoreception. So even before I began scuba diving, I had seen reefs the way many of you did back in the 1960s and 70s.

What we have all seen, but particularly in the Caribbean, has been what Jeremy Jackson calls the "shifting baseline." (If you haven't caught some of the PSAs on their site, you are missing some great laughs. See http://www.shiftingbaselines.org)

So, another way to look at this is that we have seen conservation in reverse -- over-exploition. It is the same old story -- global population growth X consumption X a global economy. I remember when they built the first ice plant in northern Palawan and suddenly what had been a local economy of what lobster could be consumed or sold at local markets turned overnight into a global market with Taiwanese ships pulling up and buying lobster by the ton. The lobster were gone fairly quickly from Bacuit Bay.

Now, I like to eat lobster and I like to have an aquarium full of pretty reef organisms. Unfortunately, as we have seen all over the world, one fishery after another has failed and many have been closed. It was a pretty big shock to me after living overseas for many years and teaching coastal management overseas and highlighting what a leader California was -- to return to teach at UCLA and find that abalone were gone and the fishery closed -- along with many others.

Bottom line -- demand is exceeding supply and if we don't "fix" this imbalance we may push some reef ecosystems beyond their ability to recover naturally. This is what seems to be happening on reefs such as in Jamaica that were overfished as early as the 1950s. Reefs that were 85% coral in the early 1970s are now 5% coral and 95% algae ( or protists as they are now classified).

Many on this site are involved in growing and reproducing marine organisms and know more about this than most academic scientists.
What we need is to better connect this knowledge to R &D into aquaculture of marine organisms both for food and for aquaria -- so that we can balance demand with supply. In addition, if we can set aside a significant portion of our oceans (say 30%) as marine protected areas, then natural reseeding and natural growth will allow many of these areas to recover.

So this is how I view conservation -- setting aside sufficient natural areas so that we are not losing more than we are gaining -- and coming up with economic incentives for people to take better care of their marine resources and hopefully make money from them in perpetuity.

Right now, we are in a losing battle. The changes are so fast and so dramatic that ecosystems such as reefs in Jamaica are no longer the same ecosystems they were 30 years ago. For those of us old enough to have witnessed these declines it is pretty sad. We have ten teams in the Caribbean tracking the bleaching from Jamaica to Venezuela and while our data are not as bad as those reported in the press, we lost a lot of coral this year -- the hottest year in recorded history.

 

[Reef Check HQ]

I notice that there is a post from someone named "Reformac" regarding costs to do a MAQTRAC survey. MAQTRAC is the acronym for the highly detailed species specific surveys Reef Check scientists carry out at prospective and certified collection areas to determine the density of aquarium organisms. The latest peer-reviewed version of MAQTRAC is about to go off to the presses this coming week and so we should have the PDF up on our website in a few days -- pretty useful if you are having trouble sleeping.

But I would just like to make a comment about anonymous posters. I think we all know who this is, and it is interesting to consider why these people are afraid of identifying themselves. I am happy to answer legitimate questions and this one is legitimate, but I would like the poster to identify who they are or I am going to ignore it. I think that is only fair to everyone involved in this. This is not a Halloween party.

I would think it would also be useful if the person is trying to make a point, to simply make the point and not beat around the bush. Then we can respond to the point directly instead of guessing.

Greg

 

[mark@mac]

Hi Greg,

Mark Schreffler here.

Welcome to the forum and I'm really glad to see you here. Hopefully the dialogue that develops here will at least enlighten all and more importantly provide positive constructive input to our many challenges.

reformmac is a group of about 20 people who are unhappy with the way MAC is being managed. I am one of this group. I hope this dialogue can be used in a positive manner to help us all move closer to our shared goals here.

I think it's important for all involved in the trade to understand "what" the MAQTRAC is and "how" the related costs will be covered in the future. I know that currently both MAQTRAC and MAC Certification of collectors/collection areas is being paid for by the funders (USAID,MAMTI) in Phils and Indo. What ideas/plans do you (and MAC) have to ensure that future MAQTRAC surveys and MAC Certification will be paid for as I don't beleive that many, if any, collectors groups can afford this annual expense. I know that volunteers are part of this plan, are there any other ideas?

Respectfully yours,

Mark

 

[Reef Check HQ]

Hi Mark,

Good to see you come out of the closet and into the sunshine. Just as an aside, I am curious why "reformac" and others are trying to be so secretive? Is there something to hide? Why not just identify yourselves and then presumably with everyone's excellent reputation behind you, that would help you achieve your objectives? Everyone knows who the ex-employees of MAC are -- just seems a bit silly. Is it possible that this group is smaller than suggested?

Mark has asked a good question however. As reformac, Mark asked what is the cost of a MAQTRAC survey. As Mark, he asked whether these costs would be sustainable and who would pay. It is the weekend now in the Philippines but hopefully, Dr Ochavillo and Rex will chime in soon to give their perspectives.

I would start by revisiting the rationale behind MAQTRAC and the role of Reef Check in creating a sustainable system.

The only way to determine if an area is being overfished for invertebrates or fish is to determine what is there to begin with. Then as the fishery continues, it is possible, using fish stock assessment models to determine what trajectory the populations of each species are on -- and determine a catch limit that would allow the population to maintain itself. These population models are actually pretty simple -- sort of like a compound interest equation -- as first, second, and third generations grow to maturity and begin adding into the reproductive pool with a term for "reverse interest" to account for mortality and fishing. Obviously, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that if too many fish are removed, i.e. more than the population can replace through reproduction, then the population will decline. This is the story around the world of most food fisheries -- some 75% are now considered overfished and in decline. Some very dramatic ones like the E Coast cod fishery have never recovered.

I think most of us who have dived on fished reefs in the Philippines and Indonesia over the last 25 years have seen a very clear decline in abundance and species richness due to overfishing - - mainly of food fish. It is still shocking for me to walk into the fish market in Lapu Lapu, Cebu where huge tuna, marlin, sailfish, grouper, sharks (and manta rays and whale sharks) used to be displayed daily - and to see the low diversity of tiny little fish there now -- and a lot more Tilapia. The population of the Philippines has doubled since I worked there in the late 70s. Most of these people live near the coast. A global market has expanded its reach into small villages. The marine species have not changed their reproductive rates. And don't forget that ALL of these fishermen will quite happily spear butterflyfish, wrasse, angelfish etc and throw them into the stew pot for dinner.

We are working with the French company Ecocean on techniques of post-larval capture with light traps, to try to rehabilitate some of these overfished reefs cheaply. We catch the post-larvae, grow them out to a larger size, and then release them back to the reef. Some of these young fish can also be sold directly to the market. Rex can tell you more about this. We are having some initial success and would like to expand our trials.

Every year, it is important to resurvey the collection areas to check to see that nothing major has affected the populations -- could be overfishing by aquarium fishermen from outside or local, illegal fishing suing cyanide or blasting, typhoon that rip up a reef, a new development /road has buried the reef in sediment, new pollution sources, bleaching etc.

The cost depends on the size of the site and whether it is a baseline survey or a re-survey. As Mark knows, some of our sites are huge -- 70 square miles or so -- and to do a sufficient baseline survey of such a large area requires a lot of observation time with the fishermen, many individual transects and manta tows. Under the MAMTI grant from IFC, we have funding to pay for this. My guess is that with staff salaries etc thrown in, the average baseline survey to get a new area up and running is $2000 to 5,000. This cost needs to be spread over the entire life of the fishery which essentially brings the value down to zero. The recurring costs should be looked at separately.

So the real question that Mark is getting at is: who will pay for this once the MAMTI grant is finished. So lets look at some options.

Option 1: It may be that the conservation community which desires to have a sustainable trade would have to pay partially in the form of grants for this work forever. There is no reason to assume that some level of subsidy is not possible through organizations like Reef Check chasing more grants and donors who want to achieve these same goals.

Option 2: Some of the costs could be built into the trade through higher prices for certified fish -- just like we pay more for "organic" veggies in the supermarket. This is all about marketing -- which I know nothing about. But remember the "pet rock?" Available evidence suggests that some consumers are willing to pay more. Given the thousands of individual organisms caught from each reef, the individual cost per fish or invertebrate could be a few cents. Certainly, this is the model that works in other industries like fair trade coffe.

Option 3: There are many ways to reduce the annual costs of re-surveys by reducing the amount of surveys done, i.e. sub-sampling and doing some form of random sampling wherein not every site is surveyed every year, using proxy organisms instead of trying to census all species traded.

Option 4: We already train local fishermen in the basic Reef Check volunteer protcol, and some graduate to the advanced (species specific) MAQTRAC. Perhaps it will be possible to turn more of the monitoring over to cheaper local fishermen instead of the higher priced local scientists -- at least for some of the work.

So, I could go on from here, but the point is that there are many many options to reduce costs -- most not involving charging the traders. We are now involved in the MAMTI project based on a very specific proposal.

Since Mark was not involved, he may not know that that proposal took about two years to draft and gain approval from dozens of reviewers who are very sensitive to environmental issues. They require us, and it is prudent in this inital attempt -- to do the best science we can to make sure that we are not promoting and MAC not certifying overfishing of the reefs. Scientists call this the "precautionary principle." If you are not sure, then be cautious.

Finally, we are open to any suggestions from anyone on how to do a better job of monitoring and thus allowing sustainable management of these aquarium fisheries. But if you don't know what is there to start, and check back repeatedly over time, then how would you know if it is overfished and headed the way of the abalone and the cod?

Greg

 

[Jaime Baquero]

Greg,

Back in the middle 90's I worked with Ocean Voice International, le regretté Dr. Don McAllister, helping to find solutions to the many problems the trade of MO has created. It was and has been very difficult to unify efforts among the stakeholders to make sure that this trade become environmentally sustainable, economically viable and socially beneficial specially for poor fish collectors, as we know poverty doesn't mix with environmental concerns.

One of the aspects that I consider as negative in this equation has been the lack of commitment and willingness of the Filipino government to deal with the different issues. What do you think about it?

 

[Anonymous]

Greg,

First-off, welcome to Reefs.org and thanks very much for participating at the level you have so far. It's appreciated.

I am curious about a few things...

1. Is there a list of species that have been classified as overfished so far?

2. What priority is given to the ornamental fish in the MACTRAQ surveys and ? Is the primary concentration on food fish or ornamental for the post-larval rehabilitation of species?

Thanks for your time, and once again your input is most welcome here.

Peace,

Chip

 

[Reef Check HQ]

Jaime,

The reality is that environmental issues are always the last to be considered and the environmental departments are always the most poorly funded in any goverment. Here in California the Dept of Fish and Game has about 3 divers to monitor 1000 miles of rocky reef. In developing countries, the focus is on building hospitals, roads, electricity etc -- not coral reefs.

However, we have had excellent support from, and MOUs with the Bureau of Fisheries and Dept Env and Nat Resources in the Philippines and their equivalents in Indonesia. They can see that we are trying to solve a serious problem that they do not have the resources to solve.

That is why the private sector incentives are so critical for success -- and why the marine aquarium trade can turn into a solution for both itself and for the food fishery as well (through MPA creation). We cannot rely on government agencies to have the resources to solve these problems.

Greg

 

[Reef Check HQ]

Hi Chip,

Our data indicate that most high end species of food and aquarium fish are already overfished at many reefs in the Philippines and Indonesia based on a purely scientific assessment. The reality is also that fishermen continue to make a living fishing from catching these species because one angel fish every month plus lots of Chromis etc can be enough to keep them in rice. Therefore our focus is on trying to rehabilitate these fisheries so that we restore the supply through a combination of active (restocking) and passive (MPA creation) rehab to meet the demand.

So we do not have a list of overfished species because we try to look at each reef individually to see what is the situation at that reef. In practice our catch limits have been fairly in line with existing catch rates.

During MAQTRAC surveys we do several different types of survey as indicated previously. On the transect surveys we count and size every fish of every species. In other surveys we focus on ornamental fish and inverts and in Indo and Fiji we do corals.

The light trap rehab work is focused on marine ornamentals but the traps catch a variety of food fish which can also be restocked after 1 month grow out -- and for some species of e.g. grouper, this opens up another possible economic incentive for local fishermen to gain money from selling juveniles to aquaculture facilities. This work is still in its early stages so I don't want to oversell it, but it appears promising. The fish are still so small that the whole facility can fit in a small room.

Greg

 

[mark@mac]

Hi Greg

Many thanks for your detailed answers to my question. So to summarize-

It will cost a MAC Certified Collection Area annually between 2000 and 5000 USD to maintain their certification as far as MAQTRAC surveys are concerned.

It also costs a MAC Certified Collection Area annually about 1500 USD to be recertified.

So the total costs that a MAC Certified Collection Area has to pay each year to stay MAC Certified are 3500 to 6500 USD per year or 182,000 to 338,000 pesos per year.

I would like to ask a few more questions.

Can a collection area gain MAC certification without using MAQTRAC methodologies but using it’s own survey techniques that produce the same needed information?

Can a collection area gain MAC certification by successfully carrying out it’s own MAQTRAC surveys following the MAQTRAC protocols?

What checks and balances are used to verify the accuracy of MAQTRAC surveys prior to these being put forward as the basis of certification?

Thanks

Mark

 

[dizzy]

Option 2: Some of the costs could be built into the trade through higher prices for certified fish -- just like we pay more for "organic" veggies in the supermarket. This is all about marketing -- which I know nothing about. But remember the "pet rock?" Available evidence suggests that some consumers are willing to pay more. Given the thousands of individual organisms caught from each reef, the individual cost per fish or invertebrate could be a few cents. Certainly, this is the model that works in other industries like fair trade coffe.

I'm trying to understand where the few pennies per fish comes from. I guess a few areas have been certifed long enough now to have some hard data. So about what percentage of their profit would it take for the average certifed collection area to pay $5,000 a year in MAQTRAC fees?
Mitch

 

[PeterIMA]

Mitch, If the sites that are certified are in degraded areas, the collectors cannot even make a living wage. So, I don't see that there is any profit at the collectors' level that can be used to support ReefCheck surveys and/or MAC Certification.

Peter Rubec

 

[sdcfish]

Peter,

Seems to me that the areas that are degraded will either be re-evaluated and be set up for MPA's or will be next to areas that will be protected so the area will recover.

Like Greg already mentioned, funding is now in place, and will be available for a while until it becomes apparent that it can run on it's own. I am not privy to all the funding details, but it seems that funds are now available for this.

I agree with you Peter.....divers working in degraded areas will never make a living wage. That's why this management is so important to the reefs and the people working on them.

Like in Hawaii....the results show promise after the last 7-8 years of having areas set aside for no-take zones. The same should be done in the Philipines and other countries.

Best regards

Eric

 

[Reef Check HQ]

Hi Mark,

I think you need to read my response more carefully. Your calculations are incorrect and I provided a number of options for covering costs and reducing costs in future. I am not going to comment on MAC certification costs and hopefully someone from MAC will. But as a general rule, again all this is currently paid for as required but in the future no doubt MAC will be looking at ways to reduce their costs as well.

As you well know, we are currently trying something that no one has tried before and it would be a unique human experience to get it right the first time. Most efforts like this take about ten years to show signs of progress.

MAC and Reef Check have an agreement that areas may be certified using a "MAQTRAC equivalent." Reef Check is responsible for advising MAC on what methods qualify as equivalents. This has already occurred in Fiji and Hawaii. However, for the MAMTI work, Reef Check has the contractual responsibility to oversee the scientific interpretation of data and we do not want to be responsible for data collected using other techniques for this project because we cannot then vouch for its accuracy and it really messes up our database and analyses to have different parameters and formats.

You ask about who is checking the MAQTRAC data to determine accuracy.
As you know, this is a team effort involving the top local scientists in the field. Dr. Domingo Ochavillo is one of the top ichthyologists in SE Asia and arguably has more field survey experience than any other fish specialist in the region. He has been counting and sizing fish in every corner of the Philippines for 15 years. He oversees our teams in the Philippines and Indonesia -- so the data are not just collected by one individual. That is the best protection against bias. We have 13 scientists involved in the Philippines work and 7 in Indonesia. There we again have hired the most experienced field scientists we could find.

We would prefer to make all of our data public (like we do with our volunteer monitoring data) and have pushed to do this, however, it is the traders themselves and MAC who have asked us to not make the data public because they do not want other smart fishermen using the data to target certain species. We plan to get summary data up on our website shortly so that at least some is available for public consumption along with the fishery management plans. But we would be happy to make any of our data available to anyone for review if permission is granted by the local stakeholders and MAC.

I expect Dr Ochavillo will be able to give us more details on these issues when he returns to the office on Monday.

As promised, for those of you with insomnia, you can now download the draft final MAQTRAC field manual at: http://www.aquariumcouncil.org/workspac ... l_2006.pdf

Its a little slow so just be patient.

Greg

 

[Reef Check HQ]

Mitch/Peter,

I am neither a marine aquarium trade expert nor an economist -- just a lowly ecologist. This is why CCIF is a partner in the MAMTI project because they understand this stuff and hopefully one of their staff will be able to join us here to explain their views.

So all I can say is: look at the organic food bin or fair trade coffee at the supermarket and that is a working example of what we are talking about. How does that work and who pays the extra costs? Obviously the consumer ultimately does.

Can the same system be workable in the marine aquarium trade? Would a consumer be willing to pay 1 cent or $1 more for a $20 fish if it were higher quality and CN etc free? We don't know. We still dont have enough certified fish to make a dent.

No one has really tried until now and it probably took about 20 years for the above examples to become effective, and yet MOST people still do not buy organic produce, so maybe it is not correct to call it a complete success? But even a partial success like this could help the marine aquarium trade and reef conservation some.

The important point is that adding extra cost is just one of many options for how to pay for this system.

Frankly, I am far more worried about post-purchase mortality as a major factor affecting coral reef conservation than I am about factors like shipping mortality and cyanide use by fishermen. Cyanide use as a problem affecting reefs has been way overblown. The data are very sparse and full of holes. If CN use was such a big problem then most of the reefs in Indonesia and the Philippines would have been dead 20 years ago. I watched guys fishing with CN on reefs every day in front of my beach house in Cebu over a three-year period and it was very difficult to find any signs of damage to corals. The major problem affecting reefs everywhere is overfishing for food fish that is destablizing the entire ecosystem.

There is a huge need to better educate the buying public about what organisms they can handle in home aquaria. Reef Check is considering starting a program in this area -- and we would need a lot of help from the experts on this forum. We need to figure out how to get more information to retail customers and to better match sales of difficult-to-keep organisms with experienced aquarists. My guess -- and it is just a guess -- is that helping customers keep more fish and inverts alive longer in home aquaria would do more for reef conservation than anything else we can do now.

One of my UCLA students did a very simple, biased and unscientific study of retail sales from five shops in Sydney last year and came up with about 50% fish mortality out of 30 customers after 3 weeks. Who knows if that is meaningful, but it indicates that is an area where we need more work.

Greg