Holiday Inn Resort Kandooma Maldives celebrates third annual Manta Month
Holiday Inn Resort Kandooma Maldives celebrates third annual Manta Month
By MATATO Newsroom · News · · Updated
Holiday Inn Resort Kandooma Maldives is celebrating its third annual Manta Month this September, bringing guests, team members and the local community together for a month of manta encounters, education and marine conservation.
The timing could hardly be more relevant. New peer-reviewed research published in PLOS ONE in June 2026 has put a remarkable economic value on protecting the Maldives’ manta rays. The study estimates that manta ray tourism generated US$227.3 million in the Maldives in 2021, equivalent to 2.6% of national GDP, with direct economic benefits to businesses, communities and government estimated at more than US$311 million annually.
Over their lifetimes, the Maldives’ reef manta ray population is estimated to contribute US$8.6 billion in tourism revenue. The researchers calculated the lifetime tourism value of a single reef manta ray at approximately US$2.6 million.
“These numbers put into perspective something we have always believed at Kandooma: a living manta ray is incredibly valuable, not just environmentally, but to communities, tourism and the Maldives as a whole,” said Sharon Garrett, Director of Marketing & Sustainability at Holiday Inn Resort Kandooma Maldives.
“Kandooma’s Manta Month is about helping people understand what is swimming in the waters around us, why these animals are so special and why protecting them matters.”
The Maldives is home to the world’s largest known population of reef manta rays, and Kandooma’s location in South Malé Atoll places it close to an important manta aggregation area.
The Maldives Manta Conservation Programme identifies the resort’s nearby waters as an important habitat for juvenile reef manta rays. During the Southwest Monsoon, mantas feed in the sheltered Guraidhoo Falhu lagoon, also known as Sand Dunes, which contains a recognised cleaning station at Banana Reef.
Long-term Manta Trust research shows manta activity at Guraidhoo Falhu peaking between July and November, predominantly involving juvenile and sub-adult reef manta rays, placing September right in the heart of the documented peak period.
The seasonal movement of manta rays around the Maldives is closely connected to the monsoons. As ocean currents flow around the Maldives’ atolls, they help bring nutrient-rich water towards the surface, supporting concentrations of phytoplankton and zooplankton. Manta rays follow these productive feeding areas and visit cleaning stations where small reef fish remove parasites and dead skin.
Manta rays are unusually vulnerable because they reproduce very slowly. Long-term Maldives research by Manta Trust founder Dr Guy Stevens found that female reef manta rays reach sexual maturity at approximately 15 years old, while males mature at around 11 years. Their very low reproductive rate is one of the reasons manta populations recover slowly from human pressures.
Individual mantas can be identified by the unique pattern of spots on their undersides, much like a human fingerprint, allowing researchers to recognise and track the same animals over many years.
“Once you start learning about mantas, they become much more than something spectacular you hope to see on a dive,” said Garrett.
“You begin to understand that researchers can recognise individual animals, follow their movements and build up histories of their lives. That connection is exactly what we want to encourage during Manta Month at Kandooma.”
