The Blue Marine Foundation has partnered with the yacht industry to protect a growing swath of ocean.

As CEO of the Blue Marine Foundation, Clare Brook is tasked with a monumental challenge: trying to slow and effectively stop industrial overfishing on a worldwide scale. Blue Marine has been making headway. Over 1.5 million square miles of ocean are now protected—from Ascension Island, in the middle of the Atlantic (and a favorite nesting place of sea turtles), to St. Helena, off the coast of lower Africa. But there’s still much more work to be done. We caught up with Clare to learn more.

I read somewhere recently that 71 percent of the Earth is made of oceans, only 4 percent is protected. Is that still true?

It’s now closer to six, which shows how rapidly we’re making headway in terms of getting governments to protect more and more of the ocean, which is exciting. When Blue Marine was setup, in 2010, less than 1 percent was protected.