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I'm a marine biologist

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here to talk to you
about the crisis in our oceans,

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but this time perhaps not
with a message you've heard before,

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because I want to tell you
that if the survival of the oceans

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depended only on people like me,

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scientists trading in publications,

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we'd be in even worse trouble than we are.

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Because, as a scientist,

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the most important things
that I've learned

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about keeping our oceans
healthy and productive

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have come not from academia,
but from fishermen and women

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living in some of the poorest
countries on earth.

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I've learned that as a conservationist,

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the most important question is not,
"How do we keep people out?"

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but rather, "How do we make sure
that coastal people throughout the world

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have enough to eat?"

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Our oceans are every bit as critical
to our own survival

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as our atmosphere,
our forests or our soils.

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Their staggering productivity
ranks fisheries with farming

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as a mainstay of food production

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for humanity.

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Yet something's gone badly wrong.

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We're accelerating
into an extinction emergency,

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one that my field has so far
failed abysmally to tackle.

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At its core is a very human
and humanitarian crisis.

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The most devastating blow
we've so far dealt our oceans

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is through overfishing.

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Every year, we fish harder,
deeper, further afield.

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Every year, we chase ever fewer fish.

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Yet the crisis of overfishing
is a great paradox:

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unnecessary, avoidable
and entirely reversible,

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because fisheries are one of the most
productive resources on the planet.

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With the right strategies,
we can reverse overfishing.

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That we've not yet done so is, to my mind,

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one of humanity's greatest failures.

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Nowhere is this failure more apparent

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than in the warm waters
on either side of our equator.

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Our tropics are home to most
of the species in our ocean,

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most of the people whose existence
depends on our seas.

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We call these coastal fishermen and women
"small-scale fishers,"

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but "small-scale" is a misnomer

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for a fleet comprising over 90 percent
of the world's fishermen and women.

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Their fishing is generally
more selective and sustainable

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than the indiscriminate destruction

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too often wrought
by bigger industrial boats.

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These coastal people have the most
to gain from conservation

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because, for many of them,

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fishing is all that keeps them
from poverty, hunger or forced migration,

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in countries where the state
is often unable to help.

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We know that the outlook is grim:

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stocks collapsing
on the front lines of climate change,

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warming seas, dying reefs,
catastrophic storms,

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trawlers, factory fleets,

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rapacious ships from richer countries
taking more than their share.

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Extreme vulnerability is the new normal.

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I first landed on the island
of Madagascar two decades ago,

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on a mission to document
its marine natural history.

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I was mesmerized
by the coral reefs I explored,

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and certain I knew how to protect them,

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because science provided all the answers:

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close areas of the reef permanently.

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Coastal fishers
simply needed to fish less.

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I approached elders here
in the village of Andavadoaka

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and recommended that they close off

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the healthiest and most diverse
coral reefs to all forms of fishing

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to form a refuge to help stocks recover

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because, as the science tells us,
after five or so years,

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fish populations inside those refuges
would be much bigger,

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replenishing the fished areas outside,

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making everybody better off.

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That conversation didn't go so well.

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(Laughter)

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Three-quarters of Madagascar's
27 million people

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live on less than two dollars a day.

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My earnest appeal to fish less
took no account

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of what that might actually mean

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for people who depend
on fishing for survival.

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It was just another squeeze from outside,

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a restriction rather than a solution.

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What does protecting a long list
of Latin species names mean to Resaxx,

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a woman from Andavadoaka
who fishes every day

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to put food on the table

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and send her grandchildren to school?

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That initial rejection taught me
that conservation is, at its core,

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a journey in listening deeply,

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to understand the pressures
and realities that communities face

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through their dependence on nature.

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This idea became
the founding principle for my work

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and grew into an organization
that brought a new approach

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to ocean conservation

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by working to rebuild fisheries
with coastal communities.

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Then, as now, the work
started by listening,

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and what we learned astonished us.

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Back in the dry south of Madagascar,

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we learned that one species
was immensely important for villagers:

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this remarkable octopus.

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We learned that soaring demand
was depleting an economic lifeline.

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But we also learned that this animal
grows astonishingly fast,

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doubling in weight
every one or two months.

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We reasoned that protecting
just a small area of fishing ground

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for just a few months

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might lead to dramatic
increases in catches,

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enough to make a difference
to this community's bottom line

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in a time frame that might
just be acceptable.

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The community thought so too,

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opting to close a small area of reef
to octopus fishing temporarily,

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using a customary social code,

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invoking blessings from the ancestors
to prevent poaching.

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When that reef reopened
to fishing six months later,

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none of us were prepared
for what happened next.

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Catches soared,

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with men and women landing
more and bigger octopus

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than anyone had seen for years.

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Neighboring villages saw the fishing boom

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and drew up their own closures,

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spreading the model virally
along hundreds of miles of coastline.

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When we ran the numbers,

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we saw that these communities,
among the poorest on earth,

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had found a way to double their money
in a matter of months, by fishing less.

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Imagine a savings account

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from which you withdraw
half your balance every year

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and your savings keep growing.

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There is no investment
opportunity on earth

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that can reliably deliver
what fisheries can.

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But the real magic went beyond profit,

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because a far deeper transformation
was happening in these communities.

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Spurred on by rising catches,

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leaders from Andavadoaka joined force
with two dozen neighboring communities

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to establish a vast conservation area
along dozens of miles of coastline.

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They outlawed fishing with poison
and mosquito nets

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and set aside permanent refuges

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around threatened
coral reefs and mangroves,

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including, to my astonishment,

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those same sights that I'd flagged
just two years earlier

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when my evangelism for marine protection
was so roundly rejected.

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They created a community-led
protected area,

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a democratic system
for local marine governance

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that was totally unimaginable
just a few years earlier.

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And they didn't stop there:

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within five years, they'd secured
legal rights from the state

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to manage over 200 square miles of ocean,

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eliminating destructive
industrial trawlers from the waters.

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Ten years on, we're seeing
recovery of those critical reefs

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within those refuges.

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Communities are petitioning
for greater recognition

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of the right to fish

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and fairer prices
that reward sustainability.

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But all that is just
the beginning of the story,

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because this handful
of fishing villages taking action

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has sparked a marine
conservation revolution

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that has spread over thousands of miles,

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impacting hundreds of thousands of people.

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Today in Madagascar, hundreds of sites
are managed by communities

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applying this human rights-based
approach to conservation

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to all kinds of fisheries,
from mud crabs to mackerel.

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The model has crossed borders
through East Africa and the Indian Ocean

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and is now island-hopping
into Southeast Asia.

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From Tanzania to Timor-Leste,
from India to Indonesia,

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we're seeing the same story unfold:

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that when we design it right,

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marine conservation reaps dividends
that go far beyond protecting nature,

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improving catches

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and driving waves of social change
along entire coastlines,

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strengthening confidence, cooperation

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and the resilience of communities
to face the injustice of poverty

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and climate change.

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I've been privileged to spend my career

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catalyzing and connecting these movements
throughout the tropics,

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and I've learned that as conservationists,

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our goal must be to win at scale,

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not just to lose more slowly.

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We need to step up
to this global opportunity

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to rebuild fisheries:

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with field workers to stand
with communities

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and connect them, to support them
to act and learn from one another;

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with governments and lawyers
standing with communities

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to secure their rights
to manage their fisheries;

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prioritizing local food and job security

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above all competing interests
in the ocean economy;

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ending subsidies for grotesquely
overcapitalized industrial fleets

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and keeping those industrial
and foreign vessels

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out of coastal waters.

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We need agile data systems

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that put science
in the hands of communities

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to optimize conservation
to the target species or habitat.

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We need development agencies,
donors and the conservation establishment

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to raise their ambition
to the scale of investment

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urgently required to deliver this vision.

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And to get there,

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we all need to reimagine
marine conservation

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as a narrative of abundance
and empowerment,

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not of austerity and alienation;

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a movement guided by the people who depend
on healthy seas for their survival,

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not by abstract scientific values.

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Of course, fixing overfishing
is just one step to fixing our oceans.

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The horrors of warming,
acidification and pollution grow each day.

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But it's a big step.

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It's one we can take today,

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and it's one that will give
a much-needed boost

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to those exploring scalable solutions

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to other dimensions
of our ocean emergency.

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Our success propels theirs.

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If we throw up our hands in despair,

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it's game over.

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We solve these challenges
by taking them on one by one.

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Our overwhelming dependence
on our ocean is the solution

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that has been hiding in plain sight,

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because there's nothing small
about small-scale fishers.

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They're a hundred million strong
and provide nutrition to billions.

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It's this army of everyday
conservationists

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who have the most at stake.

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Only they have the knowledge
and global reach needed

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to reshape our relationship
with our oceans.

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Helping them achieve this
is the most powerful thing we can do

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to keep our oceans alive.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)