PADI AWARE’s Adopt a Dive Site® is being expanded into Adopt the Blue giving traction to the global network of PADI Mission Hubs, dive pros and divers – PADI Ocean Torchbearers. To move this up and make a difference, each of us has the opportunity to make a personal commitment to protecting and improving the health of specific aquatic sites regionally, or globally, on behalf of the ocean planet. There is scalable power in uniting the individual efforts of divers around the planet working in tandem with Mission Hubs to support the PADI Blueprint for Ocean Action and, more specifically, protecting 30 percent of the ocean by 2030. That is what it will take to move our mission forward, and it will not be possible if too many of us look at this as “someone else’s problem or opportunity.”

Adopt the Blue combines meaningful, direct actions that PADI Ocean Torchbearers take into a single place that can help inform scientists, policy makers, government authorities and the public. Dive Against Debris® and other AWARE programs, habitat conservation and restoration, organism census, and other ongoing citizen science at Adopt the Blue sites gather global data provided by diving professionals and divers, and elevate it to contribute to trend monitoring, fish and other underwater wildlife populations and MPA (Marine Protected Area) establishment.

When the need arises, PADI Divers, Pros and Mission Hubs with Adopt the Blue sites can be organized and mobilized to conduct research, gather data, educate the public, lobby local decision makers and take other appropriate actions that leverage direct, firsthand knowledge on an ongoing basis. The AWARE Community Grant program is available to help provide financial resources to fund projects that contribute to the goals of the Blueprint for Ocean Action.

If you are reading this, know that you can apply for Adopt the Blue dive sites using the PADI AWARE app or on the MPA page on padi.com. Approved and “Adopted” sites appear on the AWARE global map; these do not have to be dive sites, nor even in the ocean. All natural water bodies directly or indirectly affect the seas, so you can adopt a lake dive site, a quarry, a mangrove, a portion of river bank etc. – it just has to be part of the natural hydrosphere. It can be in your backyard or a site you visit regularly halfway around the world from where you live, as long as you’re actively carrying out conservation and monitoring there.

The PADI AWARE goal is to have 1,000 adopted sites by the end of 2022, so my hope is that every PADI Resort and Dive Center will take on the Mission Hub role, and that every PADI Pro will join the Adopt the Blue network by applying for one or more Adopt the Blue sites. It’s an engaging, powerful way to balance humanity and the seas for the rising generations and a preferred future.

So please, don’t leave it for someone else to make saving the ocean happen. Choose to engage and, together, we will move the mission forward.

To get started, go here.

Seek adventure. Save the ocean.

Drew Richardson
President & CEO

The post Straight Talk from PADI CEO: Don’t Leave It for Someone Else to Help Move Our Mission Forward appeared first on PADI Pros.

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