Every few years, the elders of Muluk, a tiny coastal community in Papua New Guinea, close a stretch of their reef to fishing. They do this to give these underwater gardens room to breathe, grow and replenish.
We first stumbled on this community-led approach back in 2001. These reefs appeared to be faring remarkably well compared to those further down the coast. This piqued our interest and led us to conduct a global search for other reef ecosystems that were seemingly defying the odds.
