Winners Announced for the World Ocean Initiative’s ‘Women and the Ocean: Changemakers Challenge’
By: Editor, Economist Group Media
Tags: Ocean Conservation, Oceans, Sustainability, Worldoceansummit, Oceanwomen

Three inspiring women from across the globe, leading the way for a sustainable ocean economy, have won the inaugural competition

We’re delighted to announce the winners of the ‘Women and the ocean: Changemakers challenge’ are:

Dr Katie St. John Glew, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of Southampton and the Marine Stewardship Council, UK.

Dr Ling Ka Yi, Chief Scientific Officer/co-founder, Shiok Meats Pte. Ltd., Singapore

Olga Lucía Caro Jácome, CEO and co-founder, Procoreef, Colombia

The competition, sponsored by The Nature Conservancy, aims to showcase leading female change makers and entrepreneurs, often overlooked, who are working to develop business solutions to achieve ocean-related sustainability and offering innovative solutions to some of the ocean’s greatest challenges. The goal is to ensure that women are visible across the ocean supply chain and their contribution is recognised and elevated.

To help bring the three changemakers’ ideas to life, they will receive guidance from renowned female ocean leaders as part of a 12-month mentorship programme and present their vision for a blue economy at the World Ocean Summit in Tokyo, Japan, on March 9th-10th 2020.

Martin Koehring, head of the World Ocean Initiative, said: “Women play a significant role in the ocean economy. However, their innovations rarely receive the support, recognition and publicity they deserve. Our challenge shows that there are incredibly talented women changemakers out there with great ideas to solve some of the ocean’s biggest challenges, such as overfishing, the decline of coral reefs and plastic pollution. Hopefully, our challenge and the mentorship programme will help to support and scale up the contributions of these inspiring women changemakers.”

Since 2012, the World Ocean Summit has become the main global event at which policymakers, business leaders, civil society and scientists gather for important discussions about the blue economy. The term ‘blue economy’ describes a sustainable ocean economy that harnesses marine ocean resources for long-term economic development and social prosperity while protecting the environment in perpetuity.

Applicants were invited to submit a short video of no longer than one minute in which they addressed the following questions: ‘How are you contributing to the sustainable development of the ocean economy? How would you benefit from an ocean leader as a mentor?’

The winning video submissions can be watched at: oceanwomen.economist.com

The three mentors are:

– Maria Damanaki, global ambassador for oceans, The Nature Conservancy. Maria will mentor Dr Katie St. John Glew and her idea to verify fish catch locations and improve traceability.

– Maren Hjorth Bauer, chief executive and co-founder, Katapult Ocean. Maren will mentor Dr Ling Ka Yi and her innovation in cell-based clean meat.

– Susi Pudjiastuti, former minister of maritime affairs and fisheries, Indonesia; founder, PT ASI Pudjiastuti Aviation;

Susi will mentor Olga Lucía Caro Jácome and her project to protect and restore coral reefs through eco-tourism.