WILDOCEANS
Greater eThekwini & Durban Port
Blue Port Project
The Blue Port Project, established in March 2019, focuses on progressively reducing the amount of plastic waste entering the Durban Port through the implementation of waste-trapping interventions in key rivers and canals. The project also aims to minimise plastic waste escaping into the ocean and to remove historical build-up of waste within the port’s ecosystem.
Greater eThekwini & Durban Port
Whale Time Project
The Whale Time Project, based at the Port Natal Maritime Museum (Durban, KZN, South Africa), continues to promote sustainable and ethical whale tourism along South Africa’s east coast. By integrating science, conservation, tourism, and community engagement, the project highlights the iconic humpback whale and its ecological importance.
uThukela
uThukela MPA EbA Project
Established in 2022 the 5-year uThukela Marine Protected Area (MPA) Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) Project funded by the Blue Action Fund, seeks to improve the social and ecological resilience in and around uThukela MPA, addressing threats to both biodiversity and the people that depend on it. READ MORE www.uthukelampa.co.za
iSimangaliso Wetland Park
iSimangaliso MPA EbA Project
The iSimangaliso Marine Protected Area (MPA) Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) project is a 4-year project funded by the Blue Action Fund that launched in August 2023. The project aims to deliver Nature-based Solutions (NbS) to climate change risk while enhancing the ecological, economic and food security prospects for dependent and vulnerable communities in the MPA. Through the protection and restoration of coral reefs, mangroves, swamp forests and coastal dune systems, the project will contribute to climate change mitigation and adaptation. By introducing effective management for the MPA and initiating Nature-based Solutions, this project will play a significant role in restoring the area to a productive and regenerative state that enables communities and the environment to become more resilient and thrive.
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National & Regional Marine Environment
RV Angra Pequena
Over the last 8 years our classic research vessel RV Angra Pequena has been used for offshore research cruises along the east coast of South Africa, and up into Mozambique, Tanzania, and Comoros. She has been the platform for some of the first mesophotic surveys (40-250m) in South Africa and in the WIO region, including four African Coelacanth Ecosystem Programme (ACEP) projects in KwaZulu-Natal and Eastern Cape waters. Equipment deployments, supported by the South African Institute of Aquatic Biodiversity (SAIAB) team, have included the SAIAB Remotely Operated Video (ROV), Stereo BRUVs (S-BRUVS), plankton nets, drop cameras, oceanographic instruments and multibeam and boomer geoscience work. The team have also found and filmed coelacanth in sub-marine canyons on three cruises to iSimangaliso MPA. She is also the ocean-home for the Ocean Stewards project, providing opportunity for young marine scientists to go to sea (often for the first time) and to engage directly with scientists. RV Angra Pequena can accommodate up to 16 people (6-10 scientists/students), can stay at sea for up to 30 days and has a fuel capacity allowing 3000nm voyages, making her a very useful cost-effective vessel for work in offshore and remote locations.
iSimangaliso MPA EbA Project – Grievance Submission
This form provides a confidential way to raise concerns, share feedback, or submit grievances related to the iSimangaliso Marine Protected Area (MPA) Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) Project. Submissions may be made anonymously and will be handled with care and respect.
National & Regional Marine Environment
Small–Scale Fishers & MPAs Project
The Small-Scale Fishers and Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) Project, funded by Oceans 5 and ICONIQ, continues to strengthen the management and sustainability of small-scale fisheries in South Africa while generating practical examples of constructive relationships between MPAs and vulnerable rural fishers living within or adjacent to them. The project advances awareness of the benefits of MPAs, the need for MPA expansion to build socio-ecological resilience for coastal communities, and the threats and solutions required to protect both ecosystems and livelihoods. Central to this effort is the piloting of co-management arrangements in iSimangaliso and uThukela MPAs, creating models of inclusive and participatory governance.
National & Regional Marine Environment
Securing Protection for South African Sharks & Rays Project
The goal of this project, which builds on the achievements of the first Shark Conservation Fund project (ended in July 2022), is to secure effective protection of South Africa’s IUCN Red List threatened and endemic sharks and rays. Key strategic interventions will secure appropriate new and improved legal provisions that protect sharks and rays via amendments to current provisions in fishery and biodiversity statutes, in conjunction with permit conditions. Further to this, effective implementation of legal provisions in fishery and biodiversity statutes and CITES regulations through enhanced capacity for enforcement and management, improved prosecution success and voluntary public compliance. The established Shark Attack Campaign (now called Sharks Under Attack) continues to educate and mobilize the public, political leaders, decision-makers, and support management action for increased understanding of the threats on sharks and rays in South Africa.
National & Regional Marine Environment
Sanctuary for Sharks and Rays Project
Started in January 2022 and funded by the Rainforest Trust (co-funded by Shark Conservation Fund and Oceans 5) in support of the National Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE), this project, aims to achieve the designation of new or expanded areas of marine protection for sharks and to ensure the protection for at least 19 threatened shark and ray species in South African waters. Together with multiple experts, government officials and the relevant management authorities, five new and expanded candidate Marine Protected Areas have been identified which could contribute ~1.4% to the expansion of the South African mainland MPA network, securing these areas as immediate priorities towards achieving the global 30x30 target for additional designated or expanded MPAs. This approach to protecting sharks and rays spatially is multi-faceted and remains in support of the 2023/2024 DFFE’s Annual Performance Plan, through the National Plan of Action for Sharks II (NPOA-Sharks II), the draft Shark Biodiversity Management Plan (Shark BMP) and the National Protected Area Expansion Strategy and the Global Biodiversity Framework Target 3 (30x30), for an additional 5% of ocean and coastal protection.
National & Regional Marine Environment
Strengthening Ocean Protection in Comoros Project
Initiated in 2021 by the WILDOCEANS programme of the WILDTRUST and funded by Oceans 5, the Strengthening Ocean Protection in Comoros project aims to improve the protection and recovery of the marine biodiversity and fisheries of the Union of Comoros, ensuring sustainable use of ocean assets and thereby enhancing the resilience of coastal communities that depend on them. This project came to an end in June 2024, but momentum around marine conservation advocacy and work on the ground has continued, and with several proposals in the pipeline to make 30x30 a reality in Comoros – we are confident this story has just begun.
National & Regional Marine Environment
South African Oil Spill Modelling & Impacts Project
The WILDOCEANS programme has developed a locally relevant South African oil spill model to predict the nature, behaviour and trajectory of oil spilled from offshore oil and gas exploration and extraction (Phase 1-ended 31 December 2022). The overall goal of this project is to stop and delay oil and gas exploration, extraction and ultimately production activities in South African offshore waters by ensuring that the environmental, social, and economic risks to, and impacts on, coastal areas are clearly understood by decision-makers, coastal communities, and the general public.
iSimangaliso Wetland Park
EMPOWERING THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN OF ISIMANGALISO PROJECT
This is a 5 year project which commenced on the 1st of February 2024, funded by The Light Foundation and co-funded by the Blue Action Fund, focusing on the vulnerable and women and children in three rural communities (villages) located on the coast at iSimangaliso Wetland Park in the uMkhanyakude District of the province of KwaZulu- Natal, also the most under-developed district in South Africa. These villages are situated directly adjacent to the iSimangaliso Marine Protected Area (MPA) and have a high dependence on natural marine and estuarine resources. These women and children include elderly women, either disabled, living alone or having to support large numbers of grandchildren, single mothers at home without income, many being young women who drop out of school due to early pregnancies, and older children (<18 years) who are head of their households. In addition to supporting these heads of destitute households, we will directly help the children in these households who are often hungry without regular and sufficient meals or access to clean water, live in impoverished conditions, often do not attend school, and are subject to health risks, including poisoning or respiratory ailments from wood-fires inside their huts.
National & Regional Marine Environment
THE MARINE PROTECTED AREA (MPA) EXPANSION AND PROTECTION PROJECT AND 30X30
Support for the Global Biodiversity Framework Target 3 (30x30) has evolved out of the South African Marine Protected Area (MPA) Expansion Project, funded by Oceans 5 between 2018 and 2023, which successfully aided the unblocking of the initial increase of MPA coverage of the mainland EEZ from 0.4% to 5.4% in 2019, through an intensive, and multi-faceted project that included both a high-profile campaign and practical support components to increase the pace and receptiveness to MPA expansion. Since then, careful strategic planning, advocacy, and partnering with the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE), has seen further and steady progress towards meeting the Global Biodiversity Framework, Target 3, 30x30 goal.