The Blue Economy Model of the Wildlife Tracker for Oceans
Marine Conservation for Sustainable Blue Economy Growth
Sustainable Blue Economy
The ocean is undoubtfully the vastest ecosystem on the Earth. It covers more than 70% of our planet's surface and sustains our living through its natural cycles, regulating the climate, and providing oxygen and food. That is not to mention the global ocean economy involving all the marine (fisheries, shipping, energy generation, etc…) and coastal (ports, tourism, aquaculture, etc…) activities. With its enormous cultural and economical values, the ocean has been extensively exploited due to anthropogenic growth which leads to the significant degradation of the marine environment and loss of biodiversity. This is an urgent call for the transformation to a more resilient blue economy. Indeed, the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals and European Green Deal are fostering the sustainable blue economy emphasizing marine biodiversity conservation, sustainable fishery, ocean pollution management, and decarbonization of the marine-related industries.
With the role of preserving marine biodiversity, enhancing the resilience of fish stocks, mitigating climate change, and opening opportunities for sustainable tourism, marine protected areas (MPAs) development is crucial strategy for the sustainable blue economy. Moreover, investments in MPAs not only contribute to biological conservation but also generate great economical benefits.
“Every euro invested in marine protected areas generates a return of at least 3 euros.” [1].
According to the European Biodiversity Strategy, for sustainable blue economy growth, MPAs are targeted to expand from 11% to 30% of the ocean coverage by 2030 [2]. However, the current global MPAs demarcation is less effective and most of the MPAs fall out of their conservation targets due to a lack of management and updated information on the changing marine ecosystems. This is the reason why the “Wildlife Tracker” exists and dedicates to the improvement of marine conservation and MPAs assessment and delimitation.
Wildlife Tracker on Blue Economy Model
“Wildlife Tracker” operates based on the Blue Economy Model as can be seen in the next diagram.
“Wildlife Tracker” gives institutional access to ocean monitoring data and marine wildlife. The platform supports marine scientists and conservation communities contribute to the global marine conservation, research, education, MPAs regulation, and coastal development with data-driven statements. The vision is to lead to global marine conservation for sustainable blue economy growth with innovative and specialized tools. From the sustainable blue economy value creation for the society, economy, and environment, “Wildlife Tracker” can prove itself as a dedicated conservation actor and blue economy partner. Therefore, it can rely on private funds and donations from NGOs, philanthropies, and institutions focused on MPAs and biodiversity conservation to keep the platform operating. In addition, corporate social responsibility and impact investment are the promising funding sources due to the sustainability strategy and biodiversity offset leveraged by the ocean-exploited industries such as offshore oil and gas, shipping and transport, commercial fishing, and telecommunications companies.
Wildlife Tracker for marine conservation
“Wildlife Tracker” is a geo-framework dedicated to wildlife conservation that is being developed under GIS4 wildlife movement analytics. The platform offers a unique opportunity to overlay the movement tracks of these animals over eco-geographical data layers to visually observe in near real-time what may be influencing the animal activities and to spatially assess their meaningful habitats. Indeed, the framework is able to retrieve wildlife tracking datasets in a near real-time approach from Argos Satellite’s live feeds. In addition, it has a connection to Copernicus Marine Service and can retrieve datasets of Ocean biogeochemistry and physical variables. Therefore, the movements of wildlife can be animated and overlayed with the environmental geoinformatics layers.
By studying the animal’s movement analytics and their meaningful spots (foraging areas, migration routes, etc…) as well as the environmental impacts on their activities, “Wildlife Tracker” brings in the marine conservation and spatial planning values that support more effective MPAs demarcation and better government of wildlife protection. “Wildlife Tracker” aims to become a data-driven source for scientific research on biodiversity conservation, marine spatial planning, and decision-making institutions on MPAs assessment and delimitation.
Implementation in the Galapagos Islands, Ecuador
The geo-framework started its implementation in April 2022 in the Galápagos Islands, Ecuador. It aims to support the management of the Galapagos Marine Reserve and the protection of endangered marine species and pristine ecosystems. Thanks to the support of the “Galapagos Whale Shark Project” the “Wildlife Tracker” have access to live data of tagged whale sharks in the open ocean around the islands. Marine scientists have the chance to overlay the movements of whale sharks with Sea Surface Temperature (SST) and Chl-a concentration as a proxy for Zooplankton productivity. The aim is to observe in near real-time what may be influencing or affecting the movement of the animals. A first demo was done with a juvenile female whale shark named “Sky” and its trajectory can be seen in the next map animation overlaid with Chl-a concentration.
If you are willing to know more about this implementation in the Galapagos Islands follow the next blog post.
Future Growth
In the future, Wildlife Tracker will open up new business opportunities for the development of geoinformatics capabilities and offer a tailor-made geo-framework as a SaaS-based on the need of our users such as wildlife observation for sustainable tourism, specific movement algorithms, and environmental indicators for marine research institutions, or the alert system and early response to the MPAs assessment for the MPAs regulators. It is our mission to take the advantage of earth observation data and digital transformation to support the protection of marine wildlife conservation and the assessment of marine spatial planning for the vision of global sustainable blue economy growth.
Reference
[1] European Commission. 2021. Blue Economy Factsheet. Retrieved from Blue Economy Factsheet (europa.eu)
[2] European Commission. 2021. COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT, THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS on a new approach for a sustainable blue economy in the EU Transforming the EU’s Blue Economy for a Sustainable Future. Retrieved from EUR-Lex — 52021DC0240 — EN — EUR-Lex (europa.eu)
