Surf Pro­tect­ed Area Networks

Save the Waves

Defined as​“a col­lec­tion of indi­vid­ual marine + coastal pro­tect­ed areas around surf­ing loca­tions” — the goal of the Surf Pro­tect­ed Areas Net­works (SPAN) is to estab­lish a sys­tem­at­ic approach to con­serv­ing large num­bers of surf ecosys­tems, util­is­ing net­works of local­ly man­aged pro­tect­ed areas that both pro­tect and are sup­port­ed by sus­tain­able surf tourism. 

In the sec­ond year of their project, Save the Waves are work­ing to har­ness the pow­er of the surf­ing com­mu­ni­ty and econ­o­my to con­serve large num­bers of marine ecosys­tems in the Por­tuguese Azores. By engag­ing the surf com­mu­ni­ty at the grass­roots lev­el in marine spa­tial plan­ning from the begin­ning, the process will have more legit­i­ma­cy, be bet­ter ori­ent­ed towards eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment and con­tain bet­ter infor­ma­tion for the zon­ing of the pro­tect­ed areas.

For more information visit: https://www.savethewaves.org/span/