Community monitoring training success

Our first 2-days of community monitoring training has been very successful. We spent the last 2 days on Lelepa Island working with 40 resource monitors to teach them reef and invertebrate monitoring techniques, and talk about marine conservation. The participants came from 37 villages in North Efate, responsible for managing 50 km2 of marine environments and local fisheries. The participants spent time learning ecological concepts and methods, and practicing monitoring of invertebrate species (giant clams and sea cucumbers) and reef health. 

This training will continue with 2-days in Saama village next week, where training will focus on fish catch surveys to inform local management of fishing activities. The trained resource monitors can start collecting information straight away to inform local decision-making.

 

Resource monitors practicing marine monitoring methods to collect reef health and invertebrate data.