Our vision

2019 was our biggest year to date with nearly 40 participating organizations and over 30 events, Halifax’s oven ocean community is riding the wave!

OWHFX aims to connect our ocean community to promote greater awareness and advocacy for the benefit of our local and global oceans, ourselves and future generations. Our goal is to foster meaningful community partnerships and support local events that are inclusive, accessible, educational, open to the public, and fun.

We focus on fostering ocean solutions and optimism through interdisciplinary science and outreach. We achieve this by streamlining all events onto a single platform, to maintain up-to-date and relevant circulation of Oceans Week efforts through social media channels, photography and videography.

2020: Read our COVID 19 Statement
2020: Read our Oceans Week HFX | Black Lives Matter Statement

Our founders

Alexandra and Mo connected in 2014 and it wasn't long after where they found themselves volunteering for the same ocean conservation groups. In 2016, they identified an opportunity to expand their volunteer hours and put their energy into growing something larger and with more impact on the broader community.

As youth volunteers last year, they became two of Taking It Global's #RisingYouth alumni. They have taken their community initiative and  over the last three years, have created opportunities for the public and youth to become engaged through an ocean education and conservation lens. Alexandra and Mo hope to continue learning about the ocean and it's relationship to people, by building genuine connections with their local community.

ALEXANDRA VANCE,
CO-FOUNDER

An ocean explorer and marine conservationist, Alexandra (she/her) currently works as a Marine Scientist and Expedition Coordinator. With an academic background in marine management, biology, and environmental sciences, she continues to work and volunteer in the not-for-profit sector with a special focus on integrated coastal and ocean management (ICOM) and local community engagement. She is a passionate science communicator, and advocates for climate justice, ocean optimism, and connecting with nature. Alexandra is a born-and-raised maritimer, and has lived in Nova Scotia for the past 13 years.

MO PHÙNG,
CO-FOUNDER

Mo Phùng (She/Her) works as the Community Specialist for Ocean Bridge at Ocean Wise. She is also a freelance QPOC photographer based in K’jipuktuk (Halifax). Her academic background is in Marine Biology and Ocean Technology. Mo’s work combines ocean sciences and visual media to focus on communication strategies within the environmental sectors and how to engage youth from across Canada. Topics close to her heart: Ocean Education and Literacy, Environmental Racism Issues, Climate Justice & Equity and 2SLGBTQIA+ Rights and Awareness.

oceans week history

Halifax is the birthplace of World’s Ocean Day

First introduced at the United Nations Earth Summit in 1992, a small team on behalf of the Government of Canada conceptualized June 8 as World Oceans Day (WOD) - a day on which the whole world would pause and participate, celebrate, and take actions in favour of our global oceans. Elisabeth Mann Borgese (founder of the International Oceans Institute) brought the idea back home to Halifax and began collaborating with local organizations, museums, academia, and government to host the first ever World Oceans Day event in 1992, long before WOD was internationally recognized in 2008.

More than 25 years later, Halifax continues the tradition of hosting the iconic WOD ocean-exhibition at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic. This initial event has since inspired many organizations throughout Halifax and the world to host their own celebrations. Today, over 100 countries participate in over 1,000 WOD events every year with 2018 having been the largest, most participated WOD to date. With 500 new organizations participating in the past year alone the message of hope and the common goal of improving the health of our oceans through collective awareness and optimism seems to be spreading ubiquitously throughout the world and its oceans.

from the founding members

This is the story of World Ocean Day’s (WOD) modest beginnings almost three decades ago. The first “Oceans Day” was designed by Canada’s International Centre for Ocean Development and launched through the Ocean Institute of Canada, on June 8, 1992, at the NGO Global Forum of the Earth Summit, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), in Rio de Janeiro. It was the genesis of a global social movement in public education and ocean literacy.

The event called for a greater awareness of our relationship with the world ocean; in particular, the need to better understand the cumulative human impacts on climate change and global warming. The theme of the very first Oceans Day in Rio was “The Health of the Blue Planet and the Health of Coastal Populations.”

Read full article here