Latin America LSMPA Enforcement Peer Learning Exchange – Colombia, 2025

In April 2025, the Reef Resilience Network piloted the new MPA Enforcement Online Toolkit with a group of 21 marine managers and enforcement officers from large-scale marine protected areas (LSMPAs) across the Latin America region at an in-person, week-long learning exchange in San Andres, Colombia. Attendees read the online toolkit as a prerequisite for the in-person workshop, learning foundational concepts for monitoring, control, surveillance, and enforcement (MCS&E) systems.  

Workshop activities focused on cross country learning exchange and hands-on work. Attendees assessed enabling conditions for their protected areas, countries, and region, and created “Sail Plans” that identified priority actions and next steps to take to implement or improve MCS&E systems in their areas. Feedback gathered by the Network during the workshop will be used to refine toolkit content and add real-world examples, as well as a Sail Plan scoping activity to the toolkit. Stay tuned for the upcoming release of the toolkit! 

The workshop was funded and hosted by Blue Nature Alliance and WildAid and supported locally by CORALINA. Participants included managers, enforcement practitioners, and representatives from national parks, national navies, and collaborative research groups from Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Mexico, Panama, and Uruguay.