A HEALTHIER OCEAN STARTS WITH LISTENING.

Mission

eOceans creatively and scientifically combining divers', fishers' and other marine explorers' observations to fill data gaps, advance knowledge, share information and build capacity at local and global scales to promote healthier global oceans.

Vision

All marine-going recreational and professional divers', fishers' and other marine explorers' actively become scientists and contribute to marine science by:

  1. Regularly contributing observations on marine animals and human use patterns to eOceans | eShark
  2. Actively recruiting locals to share observations with eOceans | eShark 
  3. Engaging with eOceans | eShark community to share results and summaries with local communities and special interest groups, and
  4. Collaborating with the eOceans | eShark Team by proposing questions and queries so that the data may be used to its full extent

Uses

eOceans data are generously provided by attentive recreational and professional marine explorers around the world. These data are used by the eOceans | eShark Team to fill important data gaps, and when combined and compared with other studies, to improve our understanding of marine animal populations and their threats around the world. These findings have already:

  1. Improved our knowledge on the distribution, habitat use and changes to shark and ray populations at different spatial and temporal scales
  2. Described previously undefined human use patterns, including fishing, ecotourism and exploitation
  3. Identified important management gaps and conservation needs
  4. Been used by communities, various organizations, governments and international governing bodies to improve shark and ray conservation – such as through shark sanctuary implementation, and CITES and CMS listing

Note: We make the data 'fuzzy' to protect animals - We value the observations made by participants and want these data to be used carefully and to the fullest extent possible —without further threatening populations. Therefore, we adhere to the best practice guidelines for sharing sensitive data according to OBIS. Therefore we do not carelessly publish or share the exact location of sensitive species that are threatened by exploitation and instead use caution and draw large geographic boxes around the locations, making the data 'fuzzy', so that shark-finner's and others that may wish to do harm, are not helped by us.