Annual Report 2023

Ten Coastal Communities

We are now working in ten Coastal Communities! This year we added Haponan to our Marine Protected Area Network!

After many obstacles we are full speed ahead on the work in Haponan.

Low tides means much more work getting the boat in the water to get to Haponan!

We also dealt with Cholera, Big Waves, Typhoon and Election Season!

We always try to involve the kids, too, in all of our educational events after all they will be the ones who benefit the most from our work!

Games help break the ice and also allows us to build team work!

We work hard on recruiting and training new teachers

When we enter a new community we must be good LISTENERS

Workshops for fisherfolk are hands on and interactive - this is one of three sessions

Building skills in managing Marine Sanctuaries (candy represents fish)!

After the community resolution is passed – we deploy buoys marking the sanctuary!

Coral Restoration

We spend several days a week maintaining our 7 coral restoration and 3 coral nurseries projects. We currently are maintaining 18,000 square feet of active coral restoration.

Our dive team consists of 4 Advanced Open Water Divers and 1 Master Diver.

Pat Donahue volunteer from USA, helped us improve our safety protocols, practice, and level up our certifications CPR

We want local fisherfolk to be empowered to protect and restore their fisheries and one way we do that is by getting them actively involved in building the structures for coral restoration.

Dona and Diane from California (and Caramoan)

We also have had visitors/interns who have helped us in other ways, ecobricks and building relationships with our local volunteers.

Melanie Partin, Arkansas joined us from May – November as Team Scientist

*Pat and Jodi Donahue, California (2nd Visit to Caramoan)*

*Fausto and Erica, California (2nd Visit to Caramoan)*

*One of 8 domes made by the community of Haponan*

New Partnership

We are excited to have formed a new partnership with Fp Island Energy who have partnered together with us in Haponan to do a Coral Restoration project. Because Fp Island Energy provideds solar power to remote coastal communitites they already have an extensive grid of solar panels at that we can tap into to provide power to our coral restoration project! Fp Island has also sponsored all of the Ribar that we need to purchase to build the artificial reef.

Visitors

We rely mostly on our local dive team to handle much of the maintenance for the coral restoration projects but we occasionally also host volunteer divers from around the world! This year we hosted guests from France, Russia, and the USA!

*Serafin and Janet Villarete,Catanduanes and California (Third Visit to Caramoan)*

Dive-In Fundraiser in May

One of the reasons that we were able to accomplish so much this year was because of your generous support at our fundraiser in Redondo Beach, California. Thank you for making time to attend this event and hear our hearts for remote coastal communities in the Philippines. We couldn’t have done this event without our amazing Board and incredible RFL Impact Team who helped us pull this event together in record time!

*Important guests from the Local Government Unit and our Partners*

*Some of the entries for the Trash Art Contest*

Let’s Shellebrate

RFL Celebrated its 8th Anniversary in September with over 300 in attendance from 9 different coastal communities! We had dance numbers, a trash art contest, games and more! What a “Shellebration”!

Trash

One of the most difficult issues Caramoan is facing is plastic trash! With a landfill that is too small to support the population and many villages without access to trash pick up means that an incredible amount of trash is being washed into the ocean. We regularly hold trash clean-ups to bring awareness to this issue!

But what are we doing with all of this trash? We Eco Brick it! An Eco Brick is a large soda bottle stuffed full of plastic trash that we then use for construction material. Thanks to a grant we were able to accomplish three projects this year!

*We love Eco Bricks because everyone can make them!*

*We also conducted Eco Brick Training at three schools (Ilawod, Bahay, and Tabgon).*

Federation

As we have increased the number of communities that we work it has meant that we have needed additional leaders. We formed the Federated Fisherfolk Sanctuary Association that comprises of all of the Presidents so that we can meet together regularly to work together to solve some of the issues that come up as well as work on leadership skills and organizational development.

*The Federated Fisherfolk Sancutuary Association*

One Caramoan Partners

Reefs for Life partners together with other service organization who share a heart for the people of Caramoan to distribute relief during times of calamity, to help support student by providing school supplies, or shoes, or conduct feed programs. We call this group One Caramoan!

*Bryan speaker at Partido State University Conference*

Speaking Engagements

Bryan, founder of Reefs for Life is often asked to speak at various events and or meetings here in Caramoan. This is an opportunity to educate others about the importance of Coral Reefs and to get other involved in our work.

*Bryan during Mass at Catholic Church in Bikal*

Livelihood

One things that we are always concerned about is finding other viable livelihoods so that the fishermen are not completely dependent on the ocean. One project we are hoping that will see some success in 2024 is Seaweed.

We are thankful to the government agency who came out to train us and the fisherfolk in Pandanan on the newest seaweed technology. We also had to learn to make buoys for our seaweed lines as they were out of stock of buoys and we didn’t want to use plastic bags or bottles in the ocean.

*Hope Farms Seaweed – harvesting in 2024*

Future

Just this last week we met with community leaders in the town of Maqueda. They are eager for our programs! We have also been invited by the town of Gibgos.

In order to enter both of these communities we will need an additional $20,000.

Our hope is that we will also be able to do begin a new Coral Restoration site. This will be another $10,000. We are also in need of monthly partners that can help us keep our dive team employed and maintaining the work that we have already begun.

Thank you for partnering with us to “Transform Communities Through Conservation”.