Alumni Profiles: Xiao Recio-Blanco LLM ’12, SJD ’15

As the director of the Ocean Program at the Environmental Law Institute (ELI), Xiao Recio-Blanco oversees a range of projects directed at the conservation and sustainable use of marine resources. Recio-Blanco manages initiatives along a broad spectrum of legal frameworks involving domestic and international law. Since joining the Ocean Program in early 2016, he served as a primary drafter of a handbook, published in collaboration with the National Geographic Pristine Seas Project, that summarizes legal tools and approaches developing nations, nonprofit organizations, citizens, and others can use to enforce and protect “marine protected areas,” such as marine reserves where fishing is banned or limited. Promoted to director in November 2016, he also is engaged in developing legal strategies for the use of environmental DNA for regulatory policymaking, researching ways to help governments in the Caribbean implement marine spatial planning, a process analogous to land-use planning. . . .