St. Vincent and the Grenadines, in the southern Eastern Caribbean, has 32 islands. St. Vincent, the mainland, is the largest island with a steep mountainous landscape. Other inhabited islands include Young Island, Bequia, Mustique, Canouan, Mayreau, Union Island, Palm Island and Petit St. Vincent. St. Vincent and the Grenadines has a large extent of coral reefs with 168 km² of reef area. Tobago Cays Marine Park, one of the longest established marine managed areas in the Caribbean, is an important nursery area for juvenile green turtles, conch, lobster, and fish.
Early AGRRA surveys were conducted in 1999 in Tobago Cays, South Coast of St. Vincent (2008) and in long term monitoring sites established in 2014 in Tobago Cays, Mustique and South Coat of St. Vincent.
The Climate-Resilient Eastern Caribbean Marine Managed Areas Network (ECMMAN) project published six Eastern Caribbean Coral Reef Report Cards – a series of individual reports for the 6 participating countries, which provide an easy-to-understand summary of the state of the region’s marine resources. The Report Cards collate data from 277 comparable coral reef surveys and map in detail 383 km² of coral reefs, 19 km² of mangrove, 286 km² of seagrass, 44 designated and 50 proposed Marine Managed Areas (MMA).
The Report Cards provide an initial baseline on the current state of the reef and identify gaps. Reporting this type of information will help track progress in protecting reefs and inform future monitoring and management. The vision is to produce report cards every 2 years and share data through the CaribNode regional spatial data platform.
In 2014, The Grenadines Network of Marine Protected Areas (GNMPA), AGRRA and SusGren conducted AGRRA surveys and established long-term AGRRA monitoring sites in Tobago Cays MMA, Mustique and South Coast.
Benthos and Fish surveys were conducted in the Tobago Keys Marine Park, St. Vincent using AGRRA protocol 2.2 and are included in the Atoll Research Bulletin, No. 496, Status of Coral Reefs in the Western Atlantic, published 2003.