A strategic framework for investment and conservation action to help save the world’s coral reefs

Overview

50 Reefs was a strategic scientific initiative co-developed by Underwater Earth and The University of Queensland with support provided by Wildlife Conservation Society and funding from Bloomberg Philanthropies, The Tiffany & Co. Foundation and Paul G. Allen Philanthropies.

Established in early 2017, the initiative had the ambitious goal of identifying a global portfolio of coral reefs with a good chance of both surviving the impacts of climate change (1.5ºC above the pre-industrial) as well as being close enough, and hence connected enough, to help repopulate neighbouring reefs in the future.

The science behind the identification of the 50 Reef locations was completed in June 2018, the result, the establishment of a global portfolio of coral reefs anticipating climate-related risks called Bioclimatic Units (BCUs).

Building on the BCU selection, WCS led a process of evaluating new and existing reef conservation approaches, building on lessons learned from across the coral reef conservation community, to further guide the strategic framework. 

Underwater Earth completed a strategic review of each of the 50 BCUs with the purpose of helping to drive incremental investment into these regions. This strategic review resulted in a series of 20 Impact Investment Reports released in September 2020.

All outputs are linked below.

Growing in impact

The 50 Reefs (BCUs) within this strategic framework include approximately 20% of all coral reefs and have the potential to help protect at least 30% of the coral species on the planet. Potentially, some 120 million people stand to benefit from increased protection of the regions identified. 

The 50 Reefs strategic framework was designed for use by multi sectoral stakeholders when making decisions regarding developing, strengthening, and expanding coral reef investment and conservation efforts and it is being used to great impact. 

It is used as a guide for investments by the Global Fund for Coral Reefs.

WWF is leading a global initiative, the Coral Reef Rescue Initiative built on the framework, focusing on protecting coral reefs least exposed to climate change in seven countries worldwide, whilst addressing the needs of communities that depend on them for survival. For more information, visit here.

In September 2021, Bloomberg Philanthropies Vibrant Oceans Initiative Landscape Assessment report (see below) was released, validating the 50 Reefs initiative, revealing 26 implementing organisations and eight funders have been performing work directly under or inspired by the 50 Reefs framework. Further more, the 50 Reefs strategic platform had generated over $100 million in coral reef investment and influenced more than 60 reef projects.

The science behind 50 Reefs

SCIENCE TEAM

The research that identified the global portfolio of coral reefs was developed by a cross-disciplinary team of scientists, led by Ove Hoegh-Guldberg at The University of Queensland, and included Dr Maria Beger, Dr Hawthorne Beyer, Dr Chaolun Allen Chen, Dr Joshua Cinner, Dr Emily Darling, Dr Mark Eakin, Dr Ruth Gates, Dr Scott Heron, Dr Emma Kennedy, Dr Nancy Knowlton, Dr David Obura, Dr Caleb McClennen, Dr Stephen Palumbi, Dr Hugh Possingham, Dr Marji Puotinen, Dr Rebecca Runting, Dr William Skirving, Dr Mark Spalding, Dr Kerrie Wilson, Dr Sally Wood and Dr John ‘Charlie’ Veron.

For more information contact Ove Hoegh-Guldberg at UQ.

SCIENTIFIC APPROACH

This broad team recognised that there is significant uncertainty in determining which coral reef regions will be hit by the impacts of climate change, when and how hard. Therefore, the strategic framework needed to not only be objective but robust in light of this climate-risk uncertainty.

To develop a plan that is effective across a range of alternative futures the team used an approach from the investment industry - Modern Portfolio Theory - to identify a portfolio of reefs that have a better chance of persisting, with a lower risk of catastrophic failure across the portfolio.

The team determined that each reef site, which they called a Bioclimatic Unit (BCU), should contain approximately 500 km² of coral reefs. This size was chosen as it is likely to capture a range of marine habitat types, genetic diversity, and ecological processes and be able to accommodate a variety of conservation measures across a range of scales.

To determine each of the BCUs in the portfolio, they used the latest global data sets to help establish the level of ‘risk’ of each BCU. Given heat stress (causing coral bleaching) and storms are two of the major climate-related threats to coral reefs, the data sets included past and projected future exposure to heat stress and storm damage, along with larval connectivity and settlement.

SCIENTIFIC OUTPUTS

In June 2018, this first-of-its-kind research resulted in the publishing in Conservation Letters of the first scientific paper detailing the global portfolio of 50 coral reefs (BCUs). This paper is entitled
“Risk-sensitive planning for conserving coral reefs under rapid climate change”.

A further scientific paper, published in Trends in Ecology and Evolution in December 2018 built on the initial scientific work and integrated insights from the conservation white papers (see Conservation section). This paper is entitled
“Securing a Long-term Future for Coral Reefs”.

Conservation support

Supporting the 50 Reefs initiative, a conservation advisory team led by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) undertook a process of evaluating new and existing reef conservation approaches, building on lessons learned from across the coral reef conservation community, to further guide the strategic framework. 

Their work can be found in the following white papers and report.

Click to download individual PDFs below.

LESSONS LEARNED

Provides a review of previous and current funding initiatives in coral reef conservation, articulating challenges, successes, lessons learnt to date and investment gaps whilst exploring the potential for leveraging future funding.

GAP ASSESSMENT

Describes the current funding landscape, including thematic and geographic priorities, including institutional capacity, strategies and geographic priorities among NGOs, IGOs, governmental agencies, and the private sector in priority geographical regions, assessing trends and gaps and identifying capacities for action.

BCU Impact Investment Reports

 Once the 50 Reef regions had been established by the science team, the team at Underwater Earth completed a strategic review of each of the 50 BCUs with the purpose of helping to drive incremental investment into these regions.

This strategic review has resulted in a series of 20 Impact Investment Reports, aimed at a broad coral reef impact investment audience: foundations, family offices, non-government organisations (NGOs) through to the growing number of venture capital (VC) and other for-profit ocean impact investors.

These reports, released in September 2020, are to be used as a guide in impact investment in the 50 Reef regions. They provide valuable insights into the coral reefs in the BCUs; their current state; local pressures; key marine protection efforts including Marine Protected Area (MPA) status plus a summary of impact investment priorities and opportunities.  

Click to download individual PDFs below. For more information contact Lorna Parry at Underwater Earth.

2021 Landscape Assessment Report

To understand the impact of 50 Reefs-inspired conservation efforts, Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Vibrant Oceans Initiative (VOI) worked with Blue Earth Consultants (Blue Earth), a Division of ERG, to perform a landscape assessment of conservation motivated by the 50 Reefs study,. The 2021 Landscape Assessment Report explained that collectively, the 50 Reefs study to date had resulted in at least 26 implementing organisations and eight funders conducting projects in over 60 reefs that ranged across more than 40 countries. Conservation efforts inspired by 50 Reefs included bottom-up interventions paired with national policy reforms that collectively support implementation of on-the-ground and institutional actions to address five threats: fishing impacts, non-point source pollution, wastewater pollution, coastal development and climatic stress. Moreover, the conservation benefits achieved by 50 Reefs-inspired work extended beyond ecological outcomes and included critical social, economic, health, and nutrition benefits for human communities. Click to download PDF below.

Additional information

The following two documents provide background information on the 50 Reefs initiative.

Click to download individual PDFs below.