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Mission Blue Dives into the 2025 IUCN World Conservation Congress

(ABU DHABI, UAE) – Last week, Mission Blue team members including Dr. Sylvia Earle and Chief Scientist Dr. Tessa Hempson attended the IUCN World Conservation Congress (IUCN WCC). The IUCN WCC occurs only every four years, and represents a significant opportunity for nature conservationists, decision-makers, and leaders to come together to develop and set benchmarks for global priorities in conservation.
Our goals at Mission Blue are to continue the work from the UN Ocean Conference in Nice. This includes affirming the One Ocean Partnership, supporting aligning motions through co-sponsorship and voting (see below), and continuing to build a network that is ready to turn high level ambition into impact for ocean protection. 
About the One Ocean Partnership, Dr. Tessa Hempson says, “The One Ocean Partnership isn’t about creating something new — it’s about bringing us together.…

Posted in Dr. Sylvia Earle, hope spots, mission blue, sylvia earle |

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Hope Spot Nominations Open to the Public!

Citizens of the Blue Planet Have Spoken: 14 New Places in the Ocean, Vetted by IUCN and Mission Blue, Will Now Serve as a Flashpoint to Ignite Global Support for Marine Protection
Over the past year, citizens and organizations across the planet have nominated marine environments especially deserving of protection – known as Hope Spots – for review by Mission Blue and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). After rigorous scientific vetting and policy analysis, Mission Blue and IUCN are proud to announce the names of 14 new Hope Spots, which came directly from a concerned global community calling out for more ocean protection. By allowing citizens to elect their own Hope Spots, Mission Blue and IUCN hope to meet the goal of igniting broad public support for a global network of marine protected areas large enough to protect and restore the ocean’s health.…

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IUCN- Planet at the Crossroads.

The IUCN World Conservation Congress 2016 kicked off two days ago in Honolulu and we can’t imagine a more auspicious occasion! Less than one week after President Obama announced the expansion of the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument around the Hawaiian atolls as the world’s largest marine protected area, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) convenes its conference on the monument’s doorstep for the first time anywhere in the United States.
In a recent response to President Obama’s announcement of the expanded Hawaiian monument, Mission Blue Founder and National Geographic Society Explorer-in-Residence Dr. Sylvia Earle remarked:

Americans on this centennial anniversary are encouraged to “find your park” and enjoy these wonders that are the collective conscious of our nation. But with President Obama’s expansion of Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument from 50 to 200 miles out from the Northern Hawaiian Islands, now the world’s largest marine protected area, history will remember this anniversary and next century as the “blue centennial”—the time when the national park idea was brought to the ocean.…

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Securing the Future for Sawfishes

There was a time when so many sawfishes were caught in areas of Pakistan that people made fences with the rostrums, the saw-like beak of the sawfish. Today, however, some people in the region might catch a sawfish just once or twice a year.
Earlier this month at the IUCN 2012 World Conservation Congress the IUCN SSC Shark Specialist Group took the opportunity to promote sawfish conservation and use networking opportunities to connect and build awareness with people who may be able to help stop sawfishes disappearing from our waters forever. One person had not even realized that sawfishes were a species present in her country and that she could help to protect them – a new supporter for sawfish conservation!…

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IUCN World Conservation Congress

By Mera McGrew
This week, leaders from governments, the public sector, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), businesses, UN agencies, and social organizations will convene in Jeju, Republic of Korea, for the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) World Conservation Congress (WCC). Held every four years, the Congress will bring together the world’s leading environmental and development experts with the aim of improving how our natural environment is managed.  It is the world’s largest and most important conservation event.
The Congress will start September 6th and go through the 15th of September. It will begin with the Forum — described as a “hub of public debate,” which will bring people together from across the globe. Cutting-edge ideas, thinking and practices surrounding pressing conservation issues will be the main focus of debate, workshops, roundtable discussions, training courses and more.…

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