.

After winning a prestigious national contest, Cristina (co-owner of Subculture) secured essential funding to bring the Reserva Natura platform pilot to the island. This tool is a game-changer for the Blue Economy, designed to improve visitor experiences while ensuring long-term conservation for Cozumel’s Biosphere Reserve and the Mesoamerican Reef System.

This collaboration establishes Cozumel’s community and scuba dive professionals as collective global pioneers in marine prosperity and conservation. Under this initiative, the owners of Subculture Mx serve as founding members of the Cozumel Marine Prosperity Coop. In partnership with the Cozumel Monitoring and Surveillance Group, local dive shops, and local institutions, this alliance is building a local-to-global model for ocean stewardship.

By implementing this pilot, the Cozumel scuba community aims to:

• Optimize Tourism Governance: Use digital reservations to manage visitor capacity, preventing the overcrowding of fragile reef sites.
• Direct Support for Conservation: Ensure that tourism revenue directly contributes to the maintenance and surveillance of protected areas.
• Enhance Local Prosperity: Provide local hosts and professionals with the technology needed to manage sustainable, profitable, and accessible tourism.

Learn more about Reserva Natura here and how it empowers communities to protect their natural heritage through technology.

This collaboration establishes Cozumel’s community and scuba dive professionals as collective global pioneers in marine prosperity and conservation. By uniting Subculture Mx—whose owners are core members of the Cozumel Marine Prosperity Coop—with Atlas Aquatica, this alliance creates a local-to-global model for ocean stewardship.

By merging Atlas Aquatica’s scientific research with the expertise of Cozumel’s dive professionals, the partnership focuses on three key objectives:

• Build a Global Map of Non-extractivism: Visualizing the social and economic value -Blue Economy-  of scuba diving to prove that protected reefs generate more prosperity than extraction.
• Empower Ocean Communities: Connecting divers and locals to lead non-extractive activities that actively protect marine ecosystems. Learn more about these cooperatives here.
• Inform Policy through Science and Community: Generating actionable data to drive sustainable blue economies and create Marine Prosperity Areas that benefit both nature and livelihoods.

To learn more about the mission, visit the Atlas Aquatica website.

Felicitamos a Sub Culture Mx y a su fundadora, amante de la identidad de la gente de mar, por su participación en la aceleradora de impacto de Comunidad Mayma. Mayma es una ONG latinoamericana que impulsa la transición hacia una economía más consciente, inclusiva y regenerativa a través de sus ejes de Territorios Regenerativos, Aceleradora de Impacto y Academia Mayma.

Parley for the Oceans celebra la colaboración con la Sociedad Cooperativa de Prosperidad Marina y Buceo de Cozumel, de la mano de su Presidenta, Cristina Balcázar Escalera, propietaria de Sub Culture Mx. Juntos demostramos que el sector turístico y en particular el de buceo puede liderar la Meta al 2030, que incluye la eliminación de plásticos de un solo uso (a través de la estrategia AIR de Parley), apoyar la vigilancia de especies clave y fortalecer los medios de vida de la gente de mar y la Economía Azul en la Reserva MaB Cozumel.