The Ocean Project Seychelles

Marine pollution is an urgent threat to the environment and the blue economy. The impact of this blight on the oceans is especially hard-felt in the Seychelles and the general region, where not only is devastating damage occuring to marine and coastal eco-systems but vast finances and labour are being invested trying to prevent the build up of plastic pollution (1). Zara and Karine, two passionate, Seychellois environmentalists, co-founded The Ocean Project (TOP) Seychelles, a non-profit organisation that aims to protect the oceans from plastics pollution. It began in 2016, with the Marine Debris Challenge whereby 300+ participants worked across 4 islands to prevent plastic pollution from entering the oceans.

TOP runs ocean clean ups, engaging participants from community groups, non-governmental organisations, schools, and businesses. Each activity takes on average two hours, and helps to educate the participants on the need for environmental action. To commemorate World CleanUp Day, in collaboration with LWMA and the Seychelles Sustainable Tourism Foundation, TOP hosted the “Seychelles’ Biggest Beach Clean-Up”, the biggest NGO and private sector collaboration in Seychelles that saw 700+ people cleaning 27 beaches across 7 islands, collecting over 3.5 tons of rubbish in the space of 1 hour. The accumulation of these activities have, to date, managed to collect approximately 14,000 kg of waste from beaches and waterways across the Seychelles islands.

In March 2019, TOP also partnered with the Islands Development Company (IDC) on the Outer Islands Clean Up, another first in Seychelles, where volunteers, posted on 8 outer islands of the archipelago, simultaneously conducted beach clean ups over 10 days. As successful environmental advocates, the team at TOP launched The Last Straw Seychelles campaign in July 2018, supported by the UNDP GEF Small Grants Programme, to reduce the use of plastic straws in Seychelles through individual commitments to stop using plastic straws and commitments from venues to stop serving them. Other key activities of TOP have been the Plastic Art project, a partnership to create art installations made from plastic debris to raise awareness about the threats of marine pollution. TOP is also implementing a 3-year marine litter monitoring programme funded by the Western Indian Ocean Marine Science Association to establish baseline data against which the efficacy of management and mitigation measures can be assessed. It has also hosted screenings using film and art to educate students and the general public in mattetrs of marine plastic pollution.