What We Do

The principal purpose of the organisation is to promote the conservation of Rodrigues’ marine biodiversity and to improve the sustainability of the local fisheries. This aim is further defined by a series of specific objectives.

Objectives

  • Promote marine environmental awareness amongst all sectors of the community, with a long-term view of ensuring the understanding and sustainable exploitation of marine ecosystems.

  • Conduct research to evaluate and monitor the local marine ecosystems and fisheries and to aid the development of resource management strategies

  • Provide training in practical techniques to ensure local people have the capacity to study and monitor their shore, lagoon and reef habitats and populations.

  • Give training to teachers, other educators and trainers to ensure the long-term local sustainability of the aims of the Association.

Shoals Rodrigues has close to 20 years’ experience of designing and implementing projects to address the problems of Marine Biodiversity loss, supporting Conservation & Marine Resource Management, Research, Education & Training and the development of Sustainable Alternative Livelihood initiatives for local stakeholders in Rodrigues.

The Association has delivered over 30 different projects ranging from: baseline assessments of the marine biodiversity, long-term monitoring programmes of marine habitats and resources, more specific scientific research projects, environmental education and training programmes targeting young people and fishers, as well as activities to support the establishment of the MPA network including supporting the implementation of alternative livelihood programmes. 

What We’ve Achieved

  • Shoals Rodrigues’ work has been supported by grants and funds from a wide range of international, regional and national organisations including: UNDP, the GEF Small Grants Programme implemented by UNDP, European Union, British, American and Canadian Governments , Fonds Français Environnemental Mondial, and various other charitable foundations in the US and UK. 

  • To improve the status of the marine environment in Rodrigues, Shoals Rodrigues worked with the fisher communities to identify and select four No-Take Marine Reserves, covering a total area of 24km2 

  • Shoals Rodrigues also supported the UNDP-GEF funded project that resulted in the establishment of the South East Marine Protected Area (SEMPA), a multiple-use MPA that cover 43km2, which was initially gazetted in 2009, and regulations with zoning plan prepared in 2011, the management plan for which has recently been updated.

  • Shoals Rodrigues has been supporting coral reef monitoring since the organisation was first established. Shoals Rodrigues has monitored the condition of coral reefs at nine sites around the island (reef flat and reef slope stations) since 2002 using a modified version of the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network (GCRMN) methodology (Lynch et al. 2002, Lynch et al. 2004, Lynch et al. 2005, Hardman et al 2006, Hardman et al. 2007, Hardman et al. 2008, Jhangeer-Khan et al. 2009, Hardman et al. 2016). 

  • Shoals Rodrigues has been working on coral restoration with funding from Duke University and Oak Foundation since 2012. The first attempt at coral restoration aimed at rehabilitating areas degraded by octopus fishing (2012 to 2015) (Jhangeer-Khan et al. 2013, Jhangeer-Khan et al. 2014, Ramphul et al. 2015). Shoals Rodrigues was then awarded a second round of funding by Shinnoyen, Japan (2018- to 2020) to initiate a larger scale community-based coral restoration and monitoring programme to address more recent damage caused by coral bleaching (Ramphul et al. 2020).

More recently, the Rodrigues Regional Assembly initiated an alternative livelihoods scheme to support those people working in the tourism industry during the Covid-19 pandemic. Shoals Rodrigues provided training to 18 beneficiaries on the basics of coral restoration, the restoration techniques used, the criteria for identifying appropriate donor and restoration sites and methodologies used for the monitoring of the coral reef and coral colony growth.