In 2021, Hope Reef was unveiled to the world and the Sheba Hope Grows™ program was launched — a 10‑year global commitment to restore degraded reefs in other regions, including the Maldives, Hawai’i, and the Great Barrier Reef, as part of one of the world’s largest coral restoration programs.
HOPE REEF
Hope Reef was born from over a decade of research and innovation into coral reef restoration. Established off the coast of Salisi' Besar in Indonesia's Spermonde Archipelago, it began as a bold effort to revive a once-thriving reef - a place left degraded after yers of destructive fishing.
2019-2021: THE MAKING OF HOPE REEF
In 2019, the Mars Sustainable Solutions team, in partnership with the SHEBA® brand began restoring this damaged reef using innovative Mars Assisted Reef Restoration System (MARRS), utilizing hexagonal steel structures called Reef Stars. These Reef Stars stabilize rubble and provide a platform for coral fragments to rapidly grow, rebuilding the reef ecosystem.
In 2021, Hope Reef was unveiled to the world and the Sheba Hope Grows™ program was launched - a 10-year global commitment to restore degraded reefs in other regions, including the Maldives, Hawai'i, and the Great Barrier Reef, as part of one of the world's largest coral restoration programs.
2021-2025: A FLOURISHING REEF
During the restoration of Hope Reef, from November 2019 to October 2025, MSS data reflects that coral growth increased from 2 to 82.5%. Over that same time period, fish populations increased by 8468%; biomass increased by 2353%; and there was a 292% rise in the number of fish species.
These positive results show why it's critically important, now, more than ever, that we continue our efforts to build and rebuild hope, scaling our efforts to teach the world to restore coral reefs and help them more quickly recover from adverse events, like storms that can have devastating effects on coral reef communities around the world. Since 2021 Sheba Hope Grows™ has supported restoration work globally across 12 countries. See our Partners page for more on our global footprint.
Mars Sustainable Solutions and partners Data tracked from November 2019 to October 2025. For more detail see MSS impact report here(open in new tab).
2026: Resilience based recovery plan
In March 2026, a regional coral disease outbreak was identified in the Spermonde Archipelago, where multiple reefs, including HOPE Reef, were affected.
In response to the outbreak, the Mars Sustainable Solutions (MSS) team deployed an urgent response team who developed and implemented containment, monitoring, research, and resilience-informed recovery strategies.
Initial monitoring confirms that while some areas of the reef have been affected, the impact is variable. Importantly, monitoring to date indicates the physical structure remains largely intact and fish communities appear broadly present; this may support recovery, which will continue to be assessed over time. Learn more here(open in new tab).
You can dive deeper into the research papers to get a better understanding of the science:
