Aspen Peak - Niche Media - Aspen living at its peak
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Lettuce coral off the shores of the Raja Ampat Islands in Indonesia Wrigley chewing-gum magnate and part-time Aspen resident William "Beau" Wrigley Jr. and OHI and organized the meeting of half a dozen ocean influencers, including Conservation Steve Katona, International director of marine research Dr. Greg Stone, business advisor Bart Sales, OHI managing director met to plan the rollout of the OHI, the statistics and international rankings of which will be made public this summer. While there have been many well-intended studies in recent years designed to help save various parts of the ocean, the OHI is a novel rating of ocean health, based on 171 "exclusive economic zones" (EEZ) surrounding coun- tries with ocean coastlines. Its creators hope it will become the lead indicator used by policymakers and conservationists around the world as they assess what's wrong with their respective seascapes and how best to repair them. That Chicago-based Wrigley was at the helm of the high-profile conser- vation project surprised even him. While Conservation International has been in the trenches of environmental battles for nearly four decades— and Stone jokes that he has spent more time underwater than above—Wrigley has never thought of himself as being particularly green. "I have dived around the world in the past 30 years," Wrigley told me and from his office in Chicago, "and today I find it more difficult to find coral reefs that are intact, harder to find big fish or sometimes any fish at all." his wife, Heather, spearheaded the idea of the Wrigley says he got involved because he wanted to turn environmental concerns—that overfishing and pollution lead to fewer fish and fewer jobs, and create risks to human health—into action. "The truth is, we've got a crisis on our hands in the degradation of the ocean and the simultaneous decline in jobs, health, and resources," he says. "If you look to 2050, we'll have nine billion people on the planet; we're going to need twice the food and twice the energy. Ocean health is a national security issue. This has got to be worrying to businessmen and governments alike." Conservation International vice president of marine conservation Sebastian Troeng. They The OHI will lend clarity to these concerns by providing a coastline- by-coastline rating of the ocean based on calculations from 10 indices of ocean health: food provision, artisanal fishing, natural products, carbon storage, livelihoods, tourism and recreation, clean waters, biodiversity, sense of place, and shoreline protection. A team of more than 60 ocean experts, coordinated and supported by founding partners Conservation International, New England Aquarium, and National Geographic, began gathering all the necessary statistics in 2009. The study focused on each country's EEZ, which extends 200 nautical miles out from its shores. Each of the 10 categories is rated on a scale of 0 to 10; each country's score, between 0 and 100, is the combined total of each category. The idea is that policymakers will use the research behind these numbers to brain- storm various solutions for their specific weaknesses. This may mean continued on page 68 aspenpeak-magazine.com 67 photography by keith ellenbogen