The world’s largest schools of squid migrate northward here, followed by industrial fishers, who are collapsing the populations. Many protected areas are home to salmon farming, an industry linked with the intensive use of antibiotics, plastic pollution, eutrophication and broader ecosystem degradation.
In 2025, we collaborated with local partners to deliver a formal proposal to double the size of the Diego Ramirez-Drake Passage MPA. We continue to support the campaign of Defendamos Chiloé to close more than 420 salmon farms in protected areas of Chilean Patagonia. Through its campaign and pressure from local organisations, an agreement was signed in 2024 between the government and two salmon farming companies, withdrawing nine aquaculture concessions from national parks in the Aysén and Magallanes regions.
We also support Patagonia Projects and their research vessel, ‘Saoirse’, including monitoring cetaceans such as humpback, blue, sei and right whales. For its part, Chile’s government has announced that it will extend its offshore MPAs, potentially protecting more than 50 per cent of territorial waters.
Agreement between the Chilean government and two salmon companies to withdraw nine aquaculture concessions from national parks in the Aysén and Magallanes regions
Blue Marine works with partners including Rewilding Chile, Patagonia Azul, SeaLegacy, Patagonia Projects and Defendamos Chiloe to protect the kelp forests of Chile’s Pacific fjords. Together we target overfishing and bycatch, industrial salmon farming, destructive trawling, and degradation of habitats — identifying key biodiversity areas and creating marine protected areas (MPAs) that work for the environment and coastal communities.
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This report presents a comprehensive overview of marine conservation efforts in Chilean Patagonia, focusing on the study and protection of baleen whales, benthic marine life, cetacean acoustics, and dolphin and orca behaviour, while highlighting community engagement, biodiversity documentation, and long-term monitoring of oceanic conditions in the Golfo de Penas, Patagonia.
23 June 2020
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From kelp forests and cold-water corals to blue whales and orcas, Patagonia teems with exceptional biodiversity. Blue Marine works with multiple partners to promote the creation of marine protected areas (MPAs) that can keep this wild place wild.
The reef ecosystem of the island nation is the seventh largest in the world and the most extensive in the Indian Ocean. Blue Marine is working with our locally affiliated NGO to make the reefs more resistant to climate change.
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