{"id":351401,"date":"2020-07-07T15:58:18","date_gmt":"2020-07-07T22:58:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/about\/newsroom\/?post_type=arcwatch&p=351401"},"modified":"2020-07-09T08:27:35","modified_gmt":"2020-07-09T15:27:35","slug":"a-little-hope-goes-a-long-way","status":"publish","type":"arcwatch","link":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/about\/newsroom\/arcwatch\/a-little-hope-goes-a-long-way","title":{"rendered":"A Little Hope Goes a Long Way"},"content":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1172,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"sync_status":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","transcript_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","castos_file_data":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[10392,325892],"tags":[347272,463891,463881,463861,463871],"arcwatch_issues":[449841],"class_list":["post-351401","arcwatch","type-arcwatch","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arcgis-online","category-arcgis-story-maps","tag-arcgis-storymaps","tag-hope-spots","tag-marine-conservation","tag-mission-blue","tag-sylvia-earle","arcwatch_issues-august-2020","arcwatch_sections-the-headlines"],"acf":{"short_description":"Mission Blue, founded by oceanographer Sylvia Earle, uses ArcGIS StoryMaps to showcase Hope Spots, marine areas in need of protection.","pdf":{"host_remotely":false,"file":"","file_url":""},"flexible_content":[{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"Sylvia Earle's Mission Blue Organization Uses Esri Technology to Bring Marine Areas Called Hope Spots to Life in the Digital Space<\/strong>\r\n\r\nThe renowned marine biologist and oceanographer Sylvia Earle once called the Gal\u00e1pagos Islands, in the Pacific Ocean, \"the sharkiest place on the planet.\" When she visited the Ecuadorian archipelago in the mid-1960s, she noted that the waters were teeming with species such as scalloped hammerhead and silky sharks.\r\n\r\nIn the early 1970s, Earle traveled to a remote location north of the Gal\u00e1pagos: Cocos Island, off the coast of Costa Rica. Like the Gal\u00e1pagos Islands, Cocos Island is a national park that's off-limits to commercial fishing. Also, each area has been named a World Heritage Site<\/a> by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).\r\n\r\nEarle marveled at the diversity of marine life around Cocos Island and noted the importance of the 120,000-square-kilometer migratory waterway between it and the Gal\u00e1pagos that's used by sharks, turtles, and other ocean species.\r\n\r\n\"It's not good enough that Cocos and Gal\u00e1pagos have a safe haven around them,\" she said. \"What about the space in between? That has to be protected too.\""},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image":355041,"image_position":"left","orientation":"horizontal","hyperlink":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"That's why Earle's nonprofit ocean conservation organization Mission Blue<\/a> designated the waterway, Cocos-Gal\u00e1pagos Swimway, as one of its global network of Hope Spots. Hope Spots are marine areas that the organization considers scientifically critical to the ocean\u2019s health. Some of them are already designated as marine protected areas (MPAs) but all need protection or additional protection and are key to Mission Blue\u2019s effort to preserve and restore the ocean. The organization has named more than 130 marine protected areas as Hope Spots.\r\n\r\nThe concept of Hope Spots comes from the dynamic vision of Earle, a legendary marine scientist and former chief scientist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Earle introduced this farsighted idea in her 2009 TED Talk<\/a>, inspiring millions of people around the world to embrace and support ocean conservation.\r\n\r\nThe story of Cocos-Gal\u00e1pagos Swimway Hope Spot<\/a>, is told in one of 130 ArcGIS StoryMaps<\/a> stories that were created to showcase Mission Blue's Hope Spots.\r\n\r\nNow you can explore all the Hope Spots\u2014including Spitsbergen Island<\/a>, Micronesian Islands<\/a>, and Revillagigedo Archipelago<\/a>\u2014by using interactive maps and StoryMaps stories, which Mission Blue created with ArcGIS technology. Esri donated the software to Earle's organization.\r\n\r\n\"Without knowing [what's going on], it is very hard to care,\" Earle said. \"Esri has given Mission Blue a powerful tool to share the view with the public, so people across the world can learn about Hope Spots and the creatures that inhabit them. Through knowing comes caring. That's cause for hope.\"\r\n\r\nMission Blue launched an interactive online platform<\/a>, developed with ArcGIS Online<\/a>, to tell the story of each Hope Spot and spread awareness about the need to protect the area from pollution, fishing, or overfishing. The platform includes a web map\u2014created with Esri's ocean basemap\u2014that shows the location of each Hope Spot.\r\n\r\n "},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image":354981,"image_position":"center","orientation":"horizontal","hyperlink":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"sidebar","layout":"spotlight","image_reference":null,"image_reference_figure":"","spotlight_image":355211,"section_title":"Protecting the Ocean","spotlight_name":"What are Hope Spots?","position":"Right","content":"While about 12 percent of the planet's land is now under some form of protection, less than 6 percent of the ocean is protected in any way.\r\n\r\nHope Spots give Mission Blue the ability to plan and look beyond current MPAs, which\u2014like national parks on land\u2014are places where exploitative uses, like fishing and deep sea-mining, are restricted. Hope Spots are often areas that need to start receiving protection, but they can also be existing MPAs where more action is needed. They can be large, or they can be small, but they all provide hope due to their having\r\n