Thank you for the incredible support shown during the DRT show last Sept 6-8. From passing by the booth, to trying our activities (from our extremely challenging trivia, to our info-tarps and videos, interactive mini-reef, calculators, and our pledge wall) and mostly through sharing your incredible energy with us, we felt the love and are grateful for the support in our environmental advocacy.

During the 3 days event, we had more than 400 visitors coming by. We’ve met free divers, scuba divers, ocean lovers, marine biologists, environmentalists, statisticians, photographers and else. We were busier than we ever thought we would be, yet we had the incredible chance to discuss with so many of you and exchange ideas, laughs and connect about our common love for the ocean. What an incredible week-end.

What did we learn from this?

1st takeaway – People (yes, you) are amazing.

Facing the complex challenges our planet and environment is struggling with, the difficult realities of environmental conservation and alarming scientific outlooks, it is easy to forget and lose hope to preserve fragile biodiversity. We all have our days of highs and lows. Spending 3 days with all of you was a perfect reminder of how powerful people are when coming together. How much energy we all have and how far passion can lead us. Whatever you are told, nothing is ever set.

So many of you participated into our ocean lover pledge wall and actively promoted your support for the Ocean and desire to actively take part in its conservation. Environmental conservation doesn’t have to be complicated and majority of the important issues and negative impact we have can be adjusted from the comfort of our home. Our lifestyles: what we eat, how we live, what we buy, how we act. This matters enormously. And all of us can (and should) do something about it.

During the event, we tried inviting you to think of small micro-actions you can implement to minimize your environmental impact (and by all doing so, collectively making a positive change). Not only you participated, but with your enthusiasm, you all warmed our hearts so much. Find a few photos below. We will post a full review on our ocean love pledge booth in the coming days. Keep an eye on social media.

Now, the ball is in your camp, to keep your pledges, act with consistency and perhaps even add a few more actions when you feel ready for it.

2.- We learned not to underestimate you. 

We challenged you with an extremely hard marine trivia and were surprised by the results. First of all, the participation rate: it took time and efforts, yet so many of you joined in! We shared great laughs watching you think hard & trying to wrap your head around the questions.

We aimed this trivia to be educational and an eye opener about the incredible marine biodiversity of the Philippines as well as its vulnerability. We quizzed you on local species diversity; threats they face, overfishing, bycatch, marine plastic, deforestation; we even asked you about your diet, or to identify critters and link it with their conservation status. Not only you took the challenge, persisted, but also you scored great! 

The average score was 66% and we even had a few incredible scorers with scores above 80%, 90% and even 2 equal or above 99%.  Congratulations!

We also learned a lot by looking at what you knew and what you struggled with, and you might be surprised by looking at the results… Ready to know what you answered right and wrong?

3.- Together, we can create such an impact

At CRCP we are a bunch of nerds. Of shy dreamers. From our forests or under the ocean, we do our best to protect what we are deeply in love with: wild spaces and the incredible marine & terrestrial biodiversity of the Philippines. This week-end, we went out of our comfort zone, deep in the city, to meet you all and advocate for more people joining our cause. 

With your incredible welcome and encouraging feedback, sharing your love for the ocean, you truly made us believe that everything is still possible. All along the week-end, we met and / or reunited with incredible humans that deeply care for the ocean. We visited the booth of wonderful organizations doing complementary work. We were star-struck listening to the talks of some rock star marine activists, were amazed at the beauty and skills of some photographers, we reunited with colleagues, students, friends, fellow mini or grand conservationists, and met so many new ocean lovers of all types. At our booth, so many of you came and showered us with so much love that we couldn’t help being overwhelmed by hope and positivity. We were dreaming of it, but you proved us that ALL of us care and want to act. Want to protect. And therefore, that change is possible. This, made us full of energy and happiness.

As you may know, Coral Reef & Rainforest Conservation Project is a new NGO, created only a year ago with the ambition to protect the wild, focusing on biodiversity hotspots such as coral reefs, mangroves and tropical forests. Rather than trying to do it all alone with limited means, our vision is to build and become a bridge between scientific research and regular people. We truly believe in the importance of sharing knowledge, skills, and empowering everyone who wish into having the necessary tools to take an active part into environmental conservation. There is a true need for more manpower to act for the environment and everyone with their own set of skills and uniqueness can help. And we have always been convinced that given the right opportunities, everyone would be happy to protect the environment in every way they can.

In CRCP, we are all volunteers, and we are betting our time & efforts on this. This week-end you proved us right. And in the future, we hope you continue and further your conservation journey. And if ever skills or knowledge are lacking, just know that we are here, and always happy to share ours with you so that you have them and can spread them too. We believe in inspiring, in sharing, we believe in the ripple effect, and we believe in all of you. Our ocean and forests need it. We all need it. This is why we do what we do at CRCP.

Thank you for answering our call.