Blue Science

Blue SSI aims to communicate research findings to policymakers and the public; provide support to the Blue Marine team; quantify the impact of our projects; and identify technology and innovation that can improve our conservation efforts. 

In 2025, we supported the marine spatial planning efforts of the Barbados government by identifying research priorities and developing a baseline report of marine and coastal biodiversity. Our work in St Vincent and the Grenadines brought together its Environment Fund and local fishermen to conduct conch surveys and support lobster conservation initiatives.

In Uruguay, we supported an eDNA project in partnership with ETH Zurich to monitor biodiversity in potential marine protected areas (MPAs). Blue SII also worked with Blue Climate to publish a report designing and integrating climate-resilient MPAs into marine spatial planning.  

In the Maldives, we supported local partners in uncovering local seafood sourcing characteristics of tourism operators and recommended future fisheries management actions. We also supported the trial of vessel monitoring systems (VMS) on five small-scale fishing boats after an extensive consultation period with the fishing community. The use of VMS is now providing greater transparency around fishing activities conducted through the sustainable resort fishery programme of our partners Maldives Resilient Reefs. Blue SII will continue to review the success of the trial through 2026, and this will support the teams wider work to further digitise the Fish for Tomorrow programme.  

In addition, the team received funding from Zendesk to kick-start an exciting project to understand the barriers and opportunities for technology use within MPA design and management. This work will be conducted in collaboration with conservation technology network WILDLABS. 

In 2023, Blue SSI also supported research on the Dutch Caribbean island of St Maarten by analysing acoustic telemetry used to track the movement of sharks. Our impact team worked closely with partners in Africa to develop a streamlined monitoring and evaluation system for the Namibia Islands MPA, and in the UK we built a valuation report for ecosystem services in Scotland.