The Rapa Nui people of Easter Island voted overwhelmingly to protect the ocean surrounding their home, and the Chilean government listened. In September 2017 C.E., Chile confirmed the creation of a 740,000-square-kilometer marine protected area off the coast of Easter Island — roughly the size of the Chilean mainland — shielding at least 142 endemic marine species from industrial extraction.
At a glance
- Rapa Nui marine park: The reserve covers 740,000 square kilometers of Pacific Ocean, banning extractive industries and industrial fishing while allowing the island’s Indigenous community to continue traditional artisanal fishing by hand line.
- Endemic species protection: At least 142 species found nowhere else on Earth live within the reserve’s boundaries, including 27 currently threatened with extinction.
- Community referendum: Easter Island’s roughly 3,000 Rapa Nui residents voted 73% in favor of the conservation zone after five years of community consultations — making this one of the most democratically grounded marine protected areas ever created.
Why this ocean matters so much
The waters around Easter Island are not typical Pacific open ocean. According to the Pew Bertarelli Ocean Legacy Project, which campaigned for the park, an astonishing 77% of the Pacific Ocean’s fish abundance occurs in this region. Recent expeditions had already discovered several species previously unknown to science.
Apex predators in the zone include scalloped hammerhead sharks, minke whales, humpback whales, blue whales, and four species of sea turtle. Deep, clear, and cool waters around Easter Island also make it a resilient area for coral reefs — a significant factor as warming ocean temperatures bleach reef systems elsewhere across the Pacific.
Scientific literature has increasingly pointed to large marine reserves as potential carbon sinks, suggesting they may play a role in climate mitigation beyond biodiversity alone. That argument added scientific weight to what was already a compelling conservation case.
A community-led victory five years in the making
The park did not happen overnight. Consultations with the Rapa Nui community began years before the September 2017 C.E. referendum, and the Mesa del mar — a coalition of more than 20 Rapa Nui groups — drove much of the organizing work.
Ludovic Burns Tuki, the coalition’s director, called the outcome “a historic moment — a great and beautiful moment for the Rapa Nui, for the world and for our oceans.” He added that the process could serve as a model for other marine reserves, one built with “respect for the human dimension.”
That human dimension was written directly into the reserve’s rules. Industrial fishing and extractive industries are banned, but Rapa Nui fishers retain the right to continue traditional artisanal fishing from small boats using hand lines with rocks for weights — the same methods their ancestors used. It is one of many marine conservation victories worldwide where Indigenous stewardship and formal protection have reinforced each other.
Matt Rand, director of the Pew Bertarelli Ocean Legacy Project, framed the stakes in both ecological and human terms: “The Rapa Nui have long suffered from the loss of timber, declining ecosystems and declining populations. Now they are experiencing a resurgence based on ensuring the health of the oceans.”
A building block for Polynesian ocean protection
The Rapa Nui reserve did not emerge in isolation. The nearby Pitcairn Islands marine protection area had been created the year before, and proposals for a reserve in the Austral Islands’ waters were already under discussion. Together, these three zones could eventually form a connected protected area of more than 770,000 square miles — a prospect Burns Tuki described as holding “unifying potential for the Polynesian people.”
“The ocean is very important to us as a source of food, but the Polynesians were great navigators and the ocean also represents our mother,” he said. “It enables us to move with a double canoe between the different islands. It gives us everything.”
Chilean President Michelle Bachelet confirmed the park in a speech, and Environment Minister Marcelo Mena noted it added to roughly 580,000 square miles of protected areas created under her administration. Plans had first been announced at a 2015 C.E. conference.
Progress with a long way still to go
The International Union for Conservation of Nature has called for 30% of the world’s oceans to be protected. At the time of the Rapa Nui park’s creation, only about 1.6% of ocean area was covered by marine protected areas — meaning even a reserve of this scale left an enormous gap.
Enforcement also remains a persistent challenge for large marine reserves. A protected area the size of the Chilean mainland requires monitoring capacity that many nations struggle to sustain, and illegal fishing continues to be a problem in remote Pacific waters. The Rapa Nui community’s role as engaged local stewards may prove to be one of the reserve’s greatest long-term assets.
Still, the numbers and the process both point toward something real. A democratically mandated, scientifically grounded marine park protecting 142 endemic species, shaped by an Indigenous community that has lived alongside these waters for centuries — that is a model worth replicating. The Pew Bertarelli Ocean Legacy Project documented the campaign in detail, and advocates are already pointing to it as evidence that ocean protection at scale is politically possible when communities lead the way.
Read more
For more on this story, see: The Guardian
For more from Good News for Humankind, see:
- Vast marine protected area in the Pacific Ocean has led to significant rebound in tuna stocks
- Chile expands ocean protection to cover more than one million square kilometres of sea
- The Good News for Humankind archive on marine conservation
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