Reef Resilience Indicators – Hawai‘i, 2016

During the IUCN World Conservation Congress, twenty-seven marine resource managers, scientists, and practitioners, representing nine countries, attended a half-day workshop to learn how to monitor coral reefs for resilience and use this information to guide management.

Workshop participants learned about resilience-based management – what it is, why it’s important, and how they can incorporate resilience concepts and strategies into existing management efforts. They got a behind the scenes look into The Nature Conservancy’s reef resilience assessment for west Hawai’i Island (what it takes to conduct an ecological resilience assessment from planning and data collection to analysis) from the Hawai’i Program’s Marine Science Director Dr. Eric Conklin. They were also treated to examples and stories from across the globe about how the results of resilience assessments have translated into management and policy from Dr. Rodney Salm, Senior Advisor, Marine Program Pacific Division, The Nature Conservancy.

Twelve of the workshop participants joined the second session - an afternoon snorkel trip to two reefs in Kaneohe Bay to provide guidance on identifying resilience indicators in the field.