Case for Support
To dive onto the Mesoamerican reef, aglow with color and diversity, is to witness some of nature’s most vital forces at work; it is to be gifted a precious window into the very foundations of life itself. Here is the sustainer, the generator, the source, the pulsing rainbow of our life-giving oceans: a privilege to see, a necessity to save. Future generations must not be denied the experience of this beautiful, bountiful, and life-supporting reef system.
The Mesoamerican reef system is the largest in the Atlantic. It spans over 1000 kilometers and across the four sovereign boundaries of Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, and Honduras and that transnational character offers a bold and unprecedented opportunity for conserving this critical global asset: a single set of strategic priorities to manage a single ecological system, a strategic plan that puts biology and people first and everything else second.
In an unprecedented marine conservation commitment, these four countries have joined together, acknowledging the urgency to take action to create a thriving reef system without boundaries. To achieve this fundamental goal, environmental funds of each of the four countries have established the MAR Fund dedicated to cooperatively planning and implementing a bold and singular set of priorities for the entire Mesoamerican reef ecoregion.
The MAR Fund is uniquely designed to attract and distribute funding at a scale that will address these regional priorities, enabling the development and financing of solutions which are beyond the mandate or capacity of local governments and non-government organizations.
This initiative, however, will only succeed if informed and caring leaders from the global philanthropic community recognize the necessity and wisdom of this transnational solution for this eco-region. With the MAR Fund in place, funders can invest with confidence in carefully designed, implemented, and monitored regional programs that are fully transparent and accountable for the expenditure and maximum impact of funds.
This is the right plan, for the right place, at the right scale and with the right people acting as a team, and represents a rare and potent convergence of opportunity. The time to invest in the Mesoamerican Reef and its people is now so that future generations can enjoy and benefit from this ecological treasure. We need partners who share this vision for a thriving reef, conserved as a regional eco-treasure for future generations.