| Volunteers
Newsletter January 2008
Greetings to all of you
who have shown your interest in volunteering for the
Roatan Marine Park ! Herewith, the first installment
of a new posting from the RMP, a newsletter aimed specifically
at existing and prospective volunteers. In here you
will find updates about the progress we (and you!) are
making towards furthering the activities of this organisation.
As things develop, there will be space for acknowledgements
of outstanding efforts made by volunteers, and for letting
you know what activities, both here on the ground and
from afar you can participate in. This is your opportunity
to give your input into shaping the RMP for the future,
and we will be exploring and writing here about new
ideas as you think of them!
Enjoy!
First of all, I would like to say
that your support of our organisation is greatly appreciated,
and it is really encouraging to see that there are so
many skilled people out there who want to help us develop
and expand our operations in the near future. I would
also like to extend my gratitude to those of you who
have already helped us out in the many varied aspects
of our activities both here on the ground and from afar,
whether it be assisting us with legal work to get our
NGO status, providing financial support, updating our
website, contributing ideas for the up and coming RMP
research laboratory, volunteering to help out with environmental
education in local communities, as well as the more
mundane but equally appreciated tasks such as assisting
with our recycling programme and helping out on beach
clean ups. Thank you!
This year is a time of change for
the park. As we enter a new year, we are hoping to expand
beyond our original mandate of patrolling the marine
park and providing mooring buoys for dive boats. This
year, not only will environmental education receive
a massive boost, but as many of you know, we are planning
to start hosting research projects. This is a very important
part of managing a marine park because as pressures
on the reef's ecological resources continually intensify
and diversify, we are increasingly facing new problems
that need to be dealt with. Roatan is changing fast,
and hunger for the dollar is driving an unprecedented
economic and development boom on the island.
New pressures include sediment-rich
runoff as a result of deforestation, a huge increase
in untreated sewage entering the sea due to total lack
of adequate infrastructure for dealing with the 1 million+
visitors coming to the island, and increasing conflicts
between an ethnically and economically divided population.
It is clear that whilst the greatest pressure on the
reef 10 years ago was over-fishing, these new superimposed
problems need new management strategies that haven’t
been necessary before. But how do we know what impact
development is having on the reef here? Simply put -
we don't! It is clear that many of Roatan's reefs have
"degraded" recently, but without quantitative
research to measure exactly "how" and “in
what way” they are degraded, and the implications
that these impacts are going to have throughout the
health of the reef as a whole, we are unable to determine
how much economic revenue will be lost by the tourism
industry if this reef ceases to exist. Only when we
can convert research into an economic value that this
reef provides to the economy, and how much revenue will
be destroyed if unchecked development continues, will
people start to listen and think about taking action.
For this, we need a research lab,
funding, and volunteers who are able to offer their
skills in practical restoration, budgeting, identification
of the most pressing problems requiring research and
many more things.
At the moment, we are in the process
of trying to obtain permission to use an abandoned lab.
Unfortunately this process is taking far longer that
hoped, and we are still in the waiting phase to know
if we can get the keys or not! Current indications are
that we may be able to start in the next 3 weeks, but
of course, until I have a definite answer I cannot offer
any definite opportunities to those of you are interested
in the lab restoration phase. For this I apologize,
and I can only blame the antiquity of the Honduran legal
process. But be assured that we need your help and will
be in touch the moment we know anything about start
dates etc.
For those of you who have expressed
interest in helping us to develop connections with Universities,
this is something we can start doing for people who
are currently thinking about conducting research projects
abroad. Lets get this started, as I feel this will help
in speeding up obtaining the lab if I can put pressure
on the authorities by saying that many people are interested
in coming to Roatan to contribute to research that will
in turn help Roatan to develop sustainably.
We hope to have a more consolidated
education program in the near future, with the possibility
of having long term volunteers taking up an educational
role. I will know more about this very soon.
In the meantime, many thanks for
supporting us and I will be in touch. Any questions
you may have, please don't hesitate to contact me.
Kind regards
James Foley
Director of Research & Development
Roatan Marine Park
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