The community is invited to attend the annual Reef Fest from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday, April 14, at Yacht Haven Grande. The event is free for everyone and there are activities for both youth and adults.
The theme for this year is Marine Ecosystem Health, which encompasses topics such as sustainable ‘seafooding,’ marine debris, coral bleaching, and mangrove protection.
Reef Fest, organized by Virgin Islands Marine Advisory Service (VIMAS), and the Virgin Islands Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (VI-EPSCoR), aims to promote and educate the Virgin Islands community about our marine ecosystems as well as highlight sustainability practices including the reduction of plastic.
The organizers of this year’s Reef Fest will educate restaurants on St. Thomas in the practice of supporting local fisheries, keeping updated / seasonal seafood menus, incorporating invasive species—that are detrimental to overall ecosystem health—in recipes.
"New to Reef Fest this year is the promotion of sustainable seafood through the Reef Responsible Program ran by Kemit Amon Lewis for The Nature Conservancy,” said Howard Forbes, Jr., Virgin Islands Marine Advisory Service (VIMAS) coordinator on St. Thomas. “Various restaurants on St. Thomas will be preparing their take on sustainable seafood samplers like lionfish." Attendees can sample these delicious delights for $3 a ticket and seven tickets are $20.
More information is available in a news release on the Media Section of the UVI website – http://www.uvi.edu/ - and from this direct link.