Hope Spots are special places that are critical to the health of the ocean — Earth’s blue heart. Some Hope Spots are already formally protected, while others still need defined protection. The Mission Blue team has embarked on a series of expeditions to shed light on these vital ecosystems and ignite support to safeguard them as marine protected areas.

The IUCN are an integral partner in the Mission Blue initiative and the Hope Spot concept ties into UN ambitions, including Canada, to commit to preserve a certain percentage of the world’s oceans akin to the land under protection.

Graham has been involved in the remote sensing and geospatial industry for more than 30 years, having worked around the world in the public and private sectors successfully designing, building and growing markets for geospatial based information technology solutions.  Graham has had a long and close association with the development and adoption of Open Standards and was the inaugural Chair of the OGC (Open Geospatial Consortium) Working Group on Data Quality.