Activity Name:  Capacity building for coral reef conservation and management in SE Asia

Country of Implementation: Thailand, Indonesia and Regional

Implementing Institutions:  University of Rhode Island/Coastal Resources Center

Host Country Counterpart Institutions:  University of California at Los Angeles

EAPEI	Estimated Expenditure by Fiscal Year of Implementation
Fiscal Year	2000	2001
Amount	$225,000	$205,000

Operating Unit: Funding:  ANE/TS              Managing: G/ENV/DAA and ANE/TS  

Objective Number:  498-015  2000 CRM-18 2001 C5

Brief Activity Description:  Reef Check is the largest international coral reef monitoring program involving recreational divers and marine scientists. Reef Check is operating in 50 countries worldwide and thus allows inter-regional and inter-reef comparisons. Reef Check has developed rapid reef health assessment and monitoring methods. Many of the key indicator organisms used by Reef Check such as humphead wrasse and butterflyfish, are also major targets of the live-fish and aquarium fish trade. Thus Reef Check offers a standardized method of tracking populations of these organisms. To be effective on a national scale, the public needs to be educated about the value of coral reefs, threats to their health and how they can become involved in caring for their own reefs. This needs to begin with children and to include adults.

The Reef Check Education, Monitoring and Management Program (RC) uses a standard method to assess and define reef health on a global scale.  After four years of operation, this volunteer program is now active in over 50 countries. Reef Check (RC) has involved teams of volunteer skin and scuba divers who have been trained and led by marine scientists in the survey of coral reefs. Through the training and survey process, participants build up a strong of sense stewardship, gain a basic understanding of coral reef ecology and the relationship of human activities to reef health. Initially designed to target recreational divers, the RC program has expanded to include people from all walks of life, including increasing numbers of coastal villagers throughout SE Asia.

The EAPEI will support three components of the Reef Check application for FY 2001.   They are 1) two training sessions at the SE Asia Regional Coral Reef Monitoring and Management Training Center at Phuket Marine Biological Center (PMBC), 2) development of socio-economic and governance measures and, 3) development of a web-based advisory support system. 

The PMBC will conduct two SE Asian training workshops. Twenty trainees will be invited to each from qualified SE Asian countries. A maximum of 40 trainees will be trained.  Ideally, these trainees will be suitable to become trainers in their home countries.  The trainees will be taught in both Reef Check and more advanced survey techniques in English, as well as taxonomy of marine organisms. Tests will be administered to assess the training. Each trainee will commit to carrying out three training workshops back home and ten surveys.

In its present form, Reef Check collects only minimal socioeconomic data.  The purpose of this component is to expand the scope and impact of Reef Check by refining a set of indicators covering the range of human factors potentially impacting coral reefs. This will broaden the program's capability as a coastal management tool. Towards this end, aspects of human activities potentially impacting coral reefs will be reviewed through information acquisition and subsequent coding in an advisory support system for inclusion in the RC survey.

The second component addresses a major limitation of the present RC program is that volunteers do not get sufficient immediate feedback regarding the meaning of the reef survey they have completed. In addition, participants are not provided with advice on what they might do to improve the health of the reefs.  Under this component, RC will collaborate with the University of Rhode Island's Coastal Resources Center to devise a Web-based Advisory Support System. RC has been invited by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to place the RC website on NOAA's Coral Health and Monitoring Program server in Washington DC.

There are three stand-alone but linked sub-projects in the FY 2000 application.  1) Share the Sea: To educate school children (8-12) about the value of coral reefs, threats to their health and solutions to these problems; 2) Reef Check: To train volunteer Thai community leaders in Reef Check methods and to survey the basic health of coral reefs in four regions of Thailand. (Optional replication in Indonesia and Philippines)  3) Training Center: To establish a coral reef monitoring and management training center at Phuket Marine Biological Laboratory to serve the region, including Indonesia and the Philippines.  

FY2001:  $205,000

FY2000: Thailand= $175,000; Indonesia= $50,000