A Healthy and Sustained Ocean System Critical For Ocean Health: David Suggett

The oceans are the source of food security and poverty eradication. However, they are under severe threat because of human activities: pollution, ocean warming, and acidification, unsustainable fisheries, and deoxygenation are a few of the many causes. They can be detrimental to the planet and have long-term effects on the oceans and people 

Stopping exploitation and conserving marine life is termed the "Blue Economy." The World Bank terms it "sustainable use of ocean resources for economic growth, improved livelihoods, and jobs while preserving the health of the ocean ecosystem."

The Middle East promises to focus on the blue economy by introducing several projects. NEOM, a megacity, promises a "blue economy," which will encourage sustainable use of marine resources.

Saudi Arabia’s flagship project, OXAGON, a city that is part of Neom, will be the largest floating structure in the world and will use 100 percent clean energy. In 2022, Israel introduced the National Centre for Innovation and Blue Economy in Haifa, which aims to promote technological innovation and entrepreneurship concerning maritime life.

In an interview with David Suggett, Chief Scientist at KAUST Reefscape Restoration Initiative, on asking about a rise in the blue economy in the Middle East, he stated, "There's been a lot of momentum, certainly in industries and economies connected to water and marine systems. Especially here, the growth of the blue economy is being catalysed by immense ecosystem service values that sustain coastal development and tourism. For maritime industries, transitioning towards transportation that reduces impacts to ecosystem service value provision – such as power through renewable energies – will be essential to evolve the blue economy." "The blue economy is the driver of innovative and sustainable industrial growth," Suggett added.

Tourism Industry’s Benefit From Greener Practices

Tourism, aquaculture, shipping, marine tourism, and marine nature conservation might benefit from adopting greener practices. Expanding on this, David Suggett replied, "Tourism is a good focal point in terms of adopting greener and more sustainable practices. One example would be Australia, where we worked closely with tourism to reposition the industry to develop more sustainable practices supporting reef conservation. One way we did that was by incorporating what we call "stewardship" practices, which is to directly manage and safeguard the resources that underpin their businesses and livelihoods.” 

"So, the tourism operators on the Great Barrier Reef became more responsible for conserving or actively restoring coral reefs there. It was a really important step for us in terms of creating social change and in fact a more resilient industry that is less reliant on just tourism" continued Suggett.

"Whenever you have tourism, you have movement of people, creating a huge energy demand. So, finding solutions about enabling movement while at the same time educating travellers to use more renewable energies is important," Suggett said.

Moreover, David Suggett also mentioned how tourists’ perception of their impact is a critical driver of change to the tourism industry’s evolution, ensuring a low (or zero) net carbon footprint. "So tourists understand they're having a small impact in terms of their visitation whilst investing into sustainable tourism operations giving back to the reef" stated Suggett.

Suggett further explained how the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) is now starting to reposition the industry as tourism operations grow. "We need to have a very large marine tourism economy so that we can adopt new, more sustainable tourism models as part of the development from the outset, establishing a more sustainable legacy for the industry."

KAUST Reefscape Restoration Initiative and Developments

The KAUST Reefscape Restoration Initiative is a large-scale coral reef restoration programme in the Red Sea in Saudi Arabia. This initiative began in 2021 and was funded by King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in partnership with NEOM. It integrates innovative technologies, pioneering coral propagation and planting, as well as ecosystem monitoring approaches to accelerate solutions for reef ecosystems. The first reefscape restoration site is located at Shushah Island, an area that supports wide and diverse coral reefs. The goal of this programme is to restore, conserve, protect, and enhance the coral reef ecosystem at a scale never previously seen worldwide.

On the current developments of this programme, David Suggett replied, "Throughout the region, there's huge interest in restoring coral reefs, primarily because of past deteriorations in local reef health. But importantly for restoration, there are still many incredibly healthy reefs that can be strategically used to help rebuild the less healthy areas."

"The challenge is the need to mitigate the impacts of further degradation and ensure that reef areas are either preserved or rebuilt. The KAUST programme uses the acronym KRRI for KAUST Reefscape Restoration Initiative," said Suggett.

"The remit of the project is to deliver restoration at a scale that's never been achieved before. The footprint of our project is 100x the size of most current reef restoration efforts worldwide. This requires innovation in approach but also entirely new regional infrastructure be developed and built. “explained Suggett.

"For more context, reef restoration, as an idea, is still relatively young. It's been undertaken by local communities, almost as a gardening approach, for decades. But it's only recently started to organise itself globally into a more industry-facing exercise that can operate at the scales that reefs exist on, which are many hectares. To achieve this unprecedented scale, we must rethink the entire model of coral (or reef) restoration, and that means taking a much more industrialised approach to how you grow coral and how you return them to the reef. The actual goal of the KRRI is to restore the 100-hectare area, whilst creating new tools, technologies and approaches that will be needed to transform efforts elsewhere" continued Suggett.

“Currently, most reef restoration is conducted on a single hectare. Our restoration region is two orders of magnitude beyond that. We do this through several practices. The first is in water coral nurseries where you can fragment and propagate coral colonies – much like a plant – under natural reef conditions. But they also sexually reproduce, which makes them pretty unique in the animal kingdom because it means that we can also exploit the sexual reproduction process to grow coral in greater abundance than you can achieve just by fragmenting them," clarified Suggett.

Moreover, Suggett also stated that one of the major goals of the project is to supplement the in-water nurseries with the world's largest land-based coral nursery. A giant aquarium system that can grow hundreds of thousands of corals at the same time under very controlled conditions, particularly exploiting the sexual reproduction phase of coral propagation. This can showcase the world and the global community of coral reef practitioners - innovative tools, and new methods to do things bigger and better.

Suggett further explained another part of the project, which is to create a full digital twin of the underwater reefscape. "We are capturing everything down to the millimetre scale at sites using stereo camera technology. We use 3D reconstructed imagery of the reef to then not only plan the restoration activity but also manage it long-term. It also means that anyone around the world can access that digital twin and have a visual experience of the reef both in its present condition and as a more fully flourishing reef over time."

"Through this project, we can ultimately deploy the facilities and technologies to restore other reefs, not only in the region but also worldwide. For land-based and coral nursery operations, it can potentially operate as a new hub to produce coral for the entire region," continued Suggett.

Obstacles In Embedding Sustainable Solutions In The System

"The biggest obstacle coral restoration has experienced to date has been a funding trap to be able to achieve scale. To innovate at new scales, sufficient capital is needed to develop transformative approaches and demonstrate what can be achieved. Most restoration activities to date have been limited by short term (small scale) funding opportunity. Reef restoration now has blended finance vehicles to overcome this, including the Saudi-KAUST funded incubator CORDAP (Coral Research & Development Accelerator Platform).  We are now overcoming huge technical bottlenecks that have stalled restoration potential; for example, propagating coral quickly and efficiently. And we've already started to grow coral at scales never seen before in this region using new structures, new facilities, and new designs," stated Suggett.

"The other challenge we have is replanting coral back on the reef. Returning coral back to the reef and getting it to cement quickly can be achieved using a physical attachment method or a chemical attachment method. We have new R&D initiatives that we operate in partnership with the Faculties at KAUST, as well as overseas collaborations including other restoration programmes worldwide. Our goal is to ensure restoration is cost-effective and efficient in terms of its deployment ability," said Suggett.

"Perhaps the most significant obstacle we have with reef restoration is simply the fact that we work underwater. Terrestrial restoration and planting trees are by comparison arguably straightforward. However, working in the water is a challenge because you have a limited amount of time. Hence, we are exploring robotics and an optimised workforce to maximise in water operations. Again, coral restoration historically has been more confined to coral gardening and much smaller-scale ventures through such fundamental obstacles," clarifies Suggett.

Investment In The Blue Economy A Boon To Ocean Health

Several important tourism initiatives and existing assets, according to a recently published report, rely heavily on ocean health. Investment in the Blue Economy Initiative may also help the region's maritime trade and logistics.

Sharing his thoughts on this, David Suggett stated, "It is a critical relationship between the ecosystem, health, and an industry. Any industry is ultimately built around the natural assets that it has. In the case of the maritime industry, reef assets might be the biodiversity you have or their geological structures in the water."

"So ensuring that you have a healthy and sustained ocean system is critical. It is also to ensure industries are positioned to be sustainable with the right relationship with the marine environment. This is why we focus on tourism as a good example of how that can work well but also work terribly. We are trying to bridge some of these barriers by reframing or innovating how we manage systems sustainably," said Suggett.

"We know that under the uncertainties of climate change projections and aggressive anthropogenic impacts, we need additional means to protect our assets and resources. Hence, many global communities reliant on marine resources are turning to reef restoration," explained Suggett.

"The problem at the moment is that many restoration activities and projects are conceived without really understanding the connection of those ecological assets to social requirements. So we are conceiving a new paradigm shift that is building a model of how people are connected to the reefs.

This can be commerce, tourism, or another industry. Identifying all of these connections enables you to understand how changing one aspect of the system can impact – positively or negatively – other aspects of the system. This can be either the reef ecology, the human stakeholder, or indeed the economic flow between ecosystem and human states," stated Suggett.

Suggett said a new portfolio of funding resources is currently available to better manage, develop, and conserve our ocean assets. But it is also important to adapt to financing and changing industries or commerce.

Apart from finding innovative reef restoration solutions, David Suggett pursues an active lifestyle by spending time in the gym and outside of the water.