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Coral Cay Conservation Project Bay Islands

Volunteers

Since 1998, over 1,000 British CCC volunteers have worked in close partnership with ‘Programa Manejo Ambiental Islas de la Bahia’ (PMAIB), Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduras (UNAH), the Bay Islands Conservation Association (BICA) and local communities, to help protect the vitally important but threatened coral reefs of the Bay Islands of Honduras.

In March 2003, CCC signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Honduran Ministry of Tourism for collaboration with (PMAIB). This event coincided with the launch of the ‘CCC Scholarship Awards’ in partnership with (UNAH).

The ‘CCC Scholarship Awards’ provide extensive and comprehensive conservation education and training opportunities for Honduran citizens, in support of an international initiative to conserve the Mesoamerican Barrier Reef ecosystem, a vast and inter-connected ‘biodiversity corridor’ of coral reefs, stretching for over 700km northwards from Honduras into the heart of the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico.

Volunteers with local children

Up to 100 ‘CCC Scholarship Awards’ have been made available to any suitable Honduran citizen wishing to make an active contribution towards the protection and sustainable use of coral reefs in Honduras. Two types of Awards are available:

‘CCC Reef Awareness Awards’
These short scholarship courses will provide training in both SCUBA diving (to PADI ‘Advanced Open Water Diver’ certification) and in general reef awareness and appreciation. Training schedules are designed to be highly flexible and tailored to the needs and availability of persons concerned, allowing recipients who, for example, might be in full-time employment and can therefore only spare a few weekends to participate.

‘CCC Reef Conservation Awards’
These four-week intensive residential scholarship courses are aimed primarily at Hondurans wishing not only to obtain SCUBA training certification, but also certification under the ‘CCC Skills Development Training Programme’. These awards are ideal for Honduran citizens who can dedicate at least four weeks of their time to intensive training and who plan to use this training to make an active and effective contribution to the conservation of Honduran coral reefs. University undergraduates are particularly welcome to apply.

For more information on how you can get involved please visit the Coral Cay website

Courtesy of Coral Cay Conservation