‍[00:02] Jennifer Wu: Hi everyone, thanks for listening to The Founder Spirit podcast. I'm your host, Jennifer Wu. In this podcast series, I interview exceptional individuals from all over the world with the founder spirit, ranging from social entrepreneurs, tech founders, to philanthropists, elite athletes, and more. Together, we'll uncover not only how they managed to succeed in face of multiple challenges, but also who they are as people and their human story. 

The following episode was recorded during the 2024 Villars Summit held by the Villars Institute, where I recorded several short interviews over a period of 3 days. The Founder Spirit Podcast is proud to be a partner of the Villars Institute, a nonprofit foundation focused on accelerating the transition to a net-zero economy and restoring planetary health.

“These really big complex problems, you're not going to fix it by just sending a ship to sea and making a lot of noise. You really have to work all of the different angles to be successful and make a difference. And that takes time, so you've got to be in it to win it.”

“We are at the point where there are so many solutions and pieces, the answer is there. It's not just this doom and gloom. And I think we all just need to realize that we can do this.” 

Joining us today is Sari Tolvanen, a Finnish marine biologist and Founder and CEO of Ocean Eye, the world’s first ecosystem service payments solution targeted for the global marine tourism sector.

Sari has worked in the marine conservation sector for two decades, from research and policy engagement at Greenpeace International to co-founding a conservation advisory group.

Just how did a former ocean campaigner come to create a solution to incentivize coastal communities to protect marine biodiversity? Well, let’s talk to her and find out.

Hello Sari, welcome to The Founder Spirit podcast! We're recording live at the fabulous Villars Summit 2024. 

[02:03] Sari Tolvanen: Thank you for the opportunity. 

[02:04] Jennifer: Growing up in Finland, can you tell us about some of the formative experiences that have impacted your life trajectory? 

[02:12] Sari: Yeah so well, Finland actually just got selected today again as the happiest country in the world for the 7th year in a row. Much to all of our... I guess we're a bit mystified as to why. 

But yeah, I guess it's a very safe and close to nature place to grow up. You know, kind of naturally, you walk or ski to school. In the summers, you can swim in the lakes freely, you have a lot of daylight, you just run around. You don't have to lock your doors, you can trust a lot of people around you. So it's a very nature-based, safe place to grow up. 

And I always loved wildlife. I remember my dad tried to take me fishing and when he wasn't looking, I was throwing all the fish back into the lake. (chuckles) Then he decided that I wasn't going to be a very good fishing buddy. So I guess there was some indication of what was to come later on. And yeah, I loved animals and that's what I spent a lot of my time on. 

And then I guess as I grew up, although my hometown was moderately-sized for Finland, even had a university, I did start to feel quite early on that it was too small and not exciting enough and I need to launch myself into the world. 

And it wasn't possible to study marine biology in Finland at the time. There was to study limnology and the limnology department was in my hometown. So there was no way. 

[03:37] Jennifer: What's limnology? 

[03:38] Sari: So it's more like lake water-based biology. So there was like no way I was going to come to university in my hometown and look at the lake life. So I decided that I wanted to spend my time looking at the bigger fish (on) the big coasts. (chuckles)

[03:54] Jennifer: So then you went to the UK. Can you tell us what drew you to study marine biology? 

[04:00] Sari: Yeah. So I guess in my early teen years, I was going through different career options. There (were) some paranormal investigations and all kinds of wild ideas that came to mind. 

But I kept thinking, like, what is it that I would do that I would want to wake up every morning and feel excited about? And then I think I was 16 and I just woke up one morning in my bed and just sat up and went, I'm going to do marine biology. That is it. And then there was no question in my mind. 

So it was just inner guidance that I listened to and then off I went. 

[04:34] Jennifer: That's nice to have that inner calling. So it's important to follow your heart, sometimes the guy upstairs shows us the way. 

[04:42] Sari: Yeah. And I did put out the intention that I wanted to find out what it was and then eventually I got the answer. 

[04:47] Jennifer: That's very nice, great story. 

And then I think for three years you were in the research role as a marine biologist. Why did you decide to transition from research to advocacy? 

[05:01] Sari: So the research that I was doing, I was diving on hard coral seabed, researching these corals in the UK and documenting the impact that the fishing industry was having. 

So a lot of it was getting destroyed. And, you know, we just had like small batches to work on where we tried to do the research. And, you know, it was obviously very frustrating. And I was like, well, what's the point of doing research when in 10 years there's not going to be anything left? 

Like, whatever I discovered about the reproductive cycle and the growth of this coral, it's going to be pointless if it's extinct. So I did very strongly feel like I wanted to go and do advocacy in order to have something to research. 

[05:44] Jennifer: And what was the motivation to join Greenpeace? 

[05:47] Sari: I always identified as a little bit of a Greenpeacer. When I was 12, I was called the Greenpeace man because there was a TV comedy show where there was this person who was always preaching at everyone about everything. And it was called the Greenpeace Man and I already got called that person at the age of 12. 

So I guess it wasn't a surprise, but it actually was a surprise for me because I had thought that I would become an academic and get a PhD and I would go on this completely different career. 

But then I realized, well, this is where I was always going to go. I just forgot about it in a path where I was getting the skills to be able to go there. 

[06:22] Jennifer: Eventually, you worked for Greenpeace for 10 years. You worked as a senior ocean campaigner at Greenpeace, which means that you were trying to end commercial fishing and illegal fishing and you led 10 Greenpeace ship expeditions. 

So can you tell us what these ship expeditions are like at high seas patrolling the area or stopping people from illegal fishing or trawling the bottom of the ocean? 

[06:54] Sari: Yeah. So obviously the ship tours is a tactic in a longer campaign that you do and build up for a long time. 

So, you know, for example, the high seas bottom trawling moratorium, there was a lot of political work going across all the countries and there was only six countries that even did the high seas bottom trawling. 

So then you would go out and document the damage that they're doing and trying to tell the rest of the world that these really large 10,000-year old corals are being destroyed just for a couple of fish that are already also 200 years old. 

So it's more like going to bear witness at sea and then bring the images and stories to the public and the consumers because otherwise, no one is there witnessing it. So a lot of it is about bearing witness and telling the stories. 

Then in some of the campaigns, I worked a long time in (the) sustainable tuna campaign, particularly with the focus in the Pacific. And we worked very closely with the Pacific Island countries and their coordination bodies. 

And there was a need to highlight some of the illegal fishing that was going on and stealing from these Pacific Island countries that are already poor countries with very few resources apart from tuna. And these rich countries from Asia and Europe and America come and take their fish illegally. So it's obviously a big sustainability and a moral problem. 

So once the campaign built enough momentum, we had a lot of political support for our asks within the Pacific Island countries. But the fishing nations were still resisting the political solutions. So then that's when things get stepped up into a direct action. 

So it's not the first tool in the box. You know, we already got the markets agreeing that they will only buy sustainable tuna, but they can't get the sustainable tuna because the political system is gridlocked because it's done on consensus and say Japan or America doesn't agree. 

So that's when the direct action is then justified. And we, for example, protected these areas, high seas areas, from fishing fleets that could fish in those areas and then sneak into their Pacific Island country waters and fish illegally. And we call them to be closed for that reason, so ease the policing. 

So yeah, that was quite traumatic (chuckles) activities then that we were again able to raise the awareness, the stakes, tell the stories. For example, in 2008, after we spent three months at sea, I think we did 18 activities on fishing boats, legal or illegal, highlighting the issues. 

And then at the follow-up political meeting in Busan in Korea, we actually got the political decision to close these high seas areas to fishing for the next three years. But there was some…

[09:27] Jennifer: a long process. 

[09:28] Sari: Yeah, it wasn't just the actions at sea. 

[09:31] Jennifer: Interesting, so there's so many questions that I have about that. First of all, I think it's actually quite dangerous, I understand, to work as a campaigner, as an ocean campaigner. Some people have gotten killed or at least harassed. Is that what you've seen in the industry? 

[09:46] Sari: Yeah, I mean Greenpeace is a very professional organization and there is a very big safety and contingency planning. For example, when we were near East Africa where there's Somali pirates, we had huge security planning. So obviously everything will try to be minimized. 

I think it's more dangerous for like a smaller organization and activists that work by themselves because there isn't the huge machinery of a global organization and their media that could then really support if something happens, if you get kidnapped or you're in danger, you're kind of by yourself. 

So what I see is that it's normally a little bit more dangerous for people who aren't part of big organizations. And what I'm also noticing is that it's more dangerous for people working on forest and land issues than on the marine side. So there's definitely a scale on the security there. 

[10:37] Jennifer: So were you ever scared? Did you ever feel somewhat… 

[10:40] Sari: Yes, definitely. I was shot at with emergency rockets once - our inflatable was attacked and it started sinking and then a big tuna boat tried to crush us. So we were all sandwiched. 

So I mean there were some situations but luckily no one was really seriously hurt at those times. But there was a couple of scratches and somebody had to go to hospital. 

[11:03] Jennifer: So you were taunted, basically.

[11:05] Sari: Yeah I mean, when things could get a bit heated up, but there was a lot of contingency plan how to get us out of there. And that worked. 

[11:12] Jennifer: And then another question that I had because I just watched Sea Conspiracy on Netflix, which is the documentary that talks about the ocean and the ills of overfishing, of commercial fisheries. 

Is there such a thing as sustainable tuna? I mean, does the word even apply to that industry? 

[11:32] Sari: Yeah, so there actually is. And this is something that we worked really hard on as part of the campaign because obviously a lot of the small islands and coastal communities, their livelihoods depend on tuna fishing and a lot of people's food security depend on it. So we've worked really hard in making sure that there was positive examples. 

So for example, the western Pacific tuna stocks are now sustainable. They weren't at the time when we were working on it, but through the kind of management improvements, the stocks are sustainable. 

And then if you fish it with the certain fishing methods that don't have a lot of bycatch, like handline, pole and line, the tuna catch is sustainable in that it is ecologically within the sustainable limits and you're not having a huge damage on other marine life. So there's definitely better alternatives. 

The problem is the scale of their traceability. So it takes a lot of work to identify those fisheries, get them online, get the traceability, work on some of the issues that might exist with safety, hygiene. Because they're kind of smaller scale fisheries, they may not have enough ice on board. 

And so there's other investments and things needed to bring them online. But there's definitely good alternatives and that I'm happy to eat. 

[12:43] Jennifer: Okay, so you do eat fish? 

[12:45] Sari: Yeah. When I moved to Indonesia, I had to start eating a little bit of fish because I became allergic to soy, never knew. On small islands, not a lot of choice. 

[12:55] Jennifer: Okay, so she does eat fish, ladies and gentlemen. 

The other thing that I heard about from watching the Netflix documentary is actually certification is a real issue. So a lot of things that you buy that is certified and you think that you're actually eating from a sustainable source actually isn't. So do you have some thoughts about that? How do we correct that problem? 

I think it goes back to the issue of livelihood, right? Because the people who are fishing, these are people from poor countries. So they need that as a way to sustain themselves - they need to make a living. Maybe this goes back to what you're doing now. 

But how do we take into the account of the whole equation, so not just looking at, okay, we need to preserve the oceans and we need to create sustainable tuna fisheries, but also how do we incorporate all the stakeholders in the ecosystem? So the policymakers, but also the people on the ground. These are people that are scraping by (in) most places that you're working. 

[14:00] Sari: Yeah. And entire country's economy might depend on fishing fleets, like in the Pacific. So it's not an easy equation to go and tell them just, oh, everybody stop eating fish. But then what are these countries supposed to do? So you have to work on making it sustainable and equitable, traceable, and so that you can prove it. 

And I agree some of these certifications are really problematic in that they keep certifying fisheries that are still on the way to becoming sustainable and they haven't made those improvements, but it's already been sold as sustainable. 

So then whether or not they will make those necessary improvements, especially when there's a high demand for the products because they’re certified to be sustainable, so that becomes an issue. 

And also these big certifications, they cost so much money to do, so then these smaller beneficiaries actually can't afford to certify. So then there are some alternatives like a fair trade certification, and there's other certification systems being developed at the moment that could meet these smaller, better fisheries, but doesn't take so much money. 

And also there's a lot of responsibilities with the market. And this is what we always said in the Greenpeace Campaign, it's for the retailer -  they have to take the responsibility. You wouldn't sell tiger meat to the consumer, so why are you selling another endangered or depleted fish species? 

So it's also for the market to have the standards and traceability and the credibility. 

[15:27] Jennifer: Yeah, I mean, another thing that I found that was super interesting is in the documentary they actually showed that there's a place in Japan, where they poach the dolphins. 

For every one dolphin that they catch as to be sold in the market, there are actually nine of them that are killed. But they're being killed for different reasons because they're not being sold. They're killed because they're seen as a competitor to the fishing industry. 

And that I just.. that's a real problem, I was really shocked to hear that. 

[15:58] Sari: Yeah. And that's even in Europe, fishermen kill seals.

[16:00] Jennifer: For that same reason. 

[16:03] Sari: For the same reason. So it's not just the Japanese, like fishermen everywhere don't like marine mammals for this reason.

[16:12] Jennifer: So after spending 10 years at Greenpeace, what lessons did you take away from that experience? 

[16:19] Sari: I mean, there were loads. But really consistently working on an issue from many different angles. 

So, for example, in the tuna campaign, we worked with our champion coastal states, who we are supporting. We worked exposing the fishing nations and the double standards in the EU and when they (were) fishing elsewhere and working through markets and even through financial channels. 

So these really big complex problems, you're not going to fix it by just sending a ship to sea and making a lot of noise. You really have to work all of the different directions and angles to be successful, make a difference. 

And that takes time. Making progress in big issues, it’s like 10+ years. So you've got to be in it to win it. 

And that was the positive thing about Greenpeace. It's a big organization whose funders don't change its mind on what it should work on if it doesn't get a progress in three years because it's supported by normal people who make donations so they can commit to these big campaigns for a long time. 

But I know, for example, a lot of other NGOs struggle to get funding for that period of time to really make a big systemic change. 

[17:25] Jennifer: When I think about when you mention the complexity of the problems, I often think it's the same thing like how do we have a smooth energy transition. And there's a lot of finger pointing to the fossil fuel industry, but at the end of the day, it's much more complex than that. 

And so what approach can we take? What lessons do you think that we've learned in terms of your work at Greenpeace that could be applied to the energy transition, which we're for sure going to talk about today or tomorrow? 

[17:56] Sari: Yeah, yeah. I mean just being here at Villars and this is one of the most hopeful things that I keep saying is that as activists we don't have to go on about it so much anymore that there's climate change, something needs to happen. 

Everyone you talk to is doing something about it. There's entrepreneurs here who's coming up with new solutions, the investors on the table, seeing how to support it. The corporations are here scratching their heads and seeing is there going to be anything here that can help us get there? So everybody's doing something now and that's really positive. 

But it's really going to take generational job and we really have to radically collaborate at this point across all different sectors and geographies and ways of doing things. 

So now it's time to stand on the shoulders of giants and just get it done. Like the solutions are there, it's just kind of finding how to scale them fast enough and effectively enough. 

[18:52] Jennifer: Interesting. So in 2014 you founded Marine Change. So you left Greenpeace and you founded your first business. Can you tell us about what motivated you to found this company and what it does? 

[19:06] Sari: Yeah. So after having worked at Greenpeace at the very global level of politics and markets and industry, I wanted to see how you can create change from a more ground up. 

So we created Marine Change to look at how we could bring up solutions and investments into the community and small-scale fishing level in Southeast Asia and the Pacific. So I was really looking at how we can bring innovations that can support that same change, but from the ground up.

[19:33] Jennifer: So that was the opportunity that perhaps that you saw at Greenpeace. 

[19:37] Sari: Yeah, and we had already started to work on some fair trade standards for fisheries. So we were already seeing how we could work at the community level and bring change. But then I decided that I needed to put more focus on it and create something different. 

The initial idea was that we were going to be an intermediary between the investors and then investable businesses that wanted to transform towards sustainability and we would figure out the investments and support needed. 

We were actually eight years too early to do that. There wasn't investors around that we have now, and also there was very little pipeline that was ready to be invested in. So the companies needed a lot of support. It was a 2-3 year job to get them investment ready and who was going to pay us in the meantime?

So we figured out that it's not going to be a sustainable model for us. So then we became an advisory group and did consultancy for the next eight years to development organizations, NGOs, some business, and then started to come back around to the original idea. 

When the time was ready and there was investment funds and they were coming to us because we'd already worked on different projects, figuring improvements and investment needs, but more for NGOs and say USAID. 

So then we actually started doing like eight years later what we originally thought. 

[21:01] Jennifer: And coming from such a big organization as Greenpeace and all of a sudden you found yourself as an entrepreneur, what was it like? 

[21:08] Sari: Yeah, it was like, where's all my emails?

[21:10] Jennifer: Why is nobody contacting me?

[21:12] Sari: Yeah, I mean it was definitely a big step and it was emotionally quite hard to leave the team and the culture. And (it) was like leaving your family in a way, although, you know, the friendships continue and also just getting used to the financial insecurity, having to work contract by contract and all of that. 

So that was definitely.. took me a while to not be so anxious about it and just go with the flow. But then it was also the positives that you can be more nimble. You can make decisions quickly, you can jump at the opportunities. 

[21:43] Jennifer: Yeah, you are the driver of your own destiny. And you founded Ocean Eye (in) 2019, tell us what it is and how did you go from Marine Change to Ocean Eye? 

[21:53] Sari: So I actually innovated Ocean Eye in a hackathon. There was a Marine Conservation Congress in Malaysia, and I participated in one of these tech competitions to a challenge on how to make marine protected areas as effective. 

And I guess it was all that perspective from having been in marine chains and working on small-scale fishery projects and marine protected area projects and sustainable tourism and getting regulations into place in Indonesia and other countries to help sustainability, but then really noticing that unless we have incentives for the coastal communities of why they should respect these rules and regulations and why conservation is a good thing, nothing really changes.

Because these areas are remote. No one's going to have the funds and the money to monitor and police them and make sure everything's followed. So there was this gap of how do we incentivize these communities that what we're talking about is a good idea when it might impact their livelihoods and got nothing positive immediately for them. 

So Ocean Eye helps fill that gap in some parts of the world. 

[23:02] Jennifer: Tell us what Ocean Eye does exactly. 

[23:04] Sari: So it is a financial transfer platform for micropayments, and the working mechanism is for marine tourists. So if you go diving, snorkeling, whale watching, kayaking, bird watching, any kind of activity where you view marine biodiversity, your operator who takes you out or yourself would operate Ocean Eye. 

And for each site, we can select the most endangered, valuable species or most wanted by the fishermen. And you would report how many of those animals you saw, so you're collecting valuable data. And then at the end of your trip or your holiday, you would get an invoice from us. 

So each sighting is priced, so it could be like 10 cents for fish or animals that are very common, or a couple of dollars for turtles, or $5 for a manta ray, or $50 if you got to swim with the blue whale for half an hour. And you get an invoice from us, and then you can choose to pay more, to pay the suggested amount, or to submit your data for $1. 

And then through our platform, we transfer that money transparently and directly to the local community. So in the area where you saw those animals, we set up payments that go to the coastal community. 

And the coastal community can view, they have a QR code and they can view how many animals people are seeing and how much money they're donating. 

And then over time, say if you kill a shark once, you can get $600 for the fins. But if that animal's seen 5,000 times for $2, the community's got a long-term income that way exceeds the one-time earnings of killing that animal once. 

[24:41] Jennifer: It's very clever. Because it goes back to changing human behavior through financial incentives, right? Because you're changing the incentive system. 

[24:54] Sari: So then obviously we're not telling the fishermen not to fish. But over time, I'm sure they will realize that it's more profitable for them to switch to other species that are not so endangered or wanted by tourists and don't impact the ecosystem so much that these animals depend on. 

[25:12] Jennifer: And you work through these diving operators or how do you…

[25:17] Sari: Yeah, so the way we (are) socializing, it's still early days. So now we have a focus on the Coral Triangle area scuba diving operations because it's obviously very biodiversity rich. 

There's a lot of tourists that have quite high willingness to pay. And also there's a lot of coastal communities that they don't partake in a lot of those activities and then money goes elsewhere.

That's our initial point of expansion, but it can work globally, anywhere. And coastal communities, small islands where there's marine tourism, we can also collect some of the sightings from high seas, Antarctica, polar regions. 

And then if there's no coastal community, we can design the project so that we, for example, support communities and some of the migratory bottlenecks of those animals to help protect them while they do their migrations and reduce the threats along the way. 

[26:09] Jennifer: I like that idea because a lot of times, when we go on these beach vacations, you're between the hotel and the dive operator, you don't necessarily think about the local fishermen because it's beyond what you normally do when you're on vacation. 

But actually, what you see in the ocean is part of their livelihood. It's all interconnected, aren't we? Very good. And so where are you now in terms of the development of Ocean Eye? You said it's early days. 

[26:36] Sari: Yeah, it's early days, but our product is actually now ready and it's being used in Indonesia and we're just setting up in Kenya, 

Yeah. So, yeah, we're ready to scale globally. 

So we have some funds to scale in Indonesia for the next year and now here at the Villars finding partners and networks and investors to make us go global. 

[27:00] Jennifer: What are your big challenges right now? Is it finding the investors? 

[27:04] Sari: Yeah, we need a particular type of investors, we need a particular type of support that isn't maybe the same as, like, climate tech. And because of the nature of our impact, the results might take longer because we have to recover nature and you may not be able to get a return until 10 years later. 

[27:23] Jennifer: Right. And from your journey as a senior ocean campaigner, and now you're a software entrepreneur, right? I mean, it's a software platform, as I understand. 

[27:35] Sari: Yeah, I’m a tech CEO. 

[27:37] Jennifer: Yeah. How is that journey going?

[27:39] Sari: Yeah, I mean, I find that I've always enjoyed learning and having new challenges. So I've definitely given myself a new challenge. And just even understanding, you know, the investment world, private capital and all of that. It's definitely a learning curve. 

The marine and the impact side and the networks that I have, that makes the implementation side a lot easier. But it's the background support and creating the ecosystem that’s… It’s new, it's exciting. So, yeah, I'm enjoying it. 

[28:07] Jennifer: And then what are the key learnings? What are some of the lessons that you like to share with the audience along this journey? 

[28:13] Sari: Yeah, I mean, you definitely need to care about the problem that you're fixing a lot. 

[28:17] Jennifer: Because it's really hard. 

[28:21] Sari: Yeah, you have to convince other people that you're going to be able to do it. So you have to be passionate and you need to deeply understand the different aspects of what you're working on and show that credibility. 

Just don't give up. You have a good idea. Just keep at it. You will be successful in the end. 

[28:38] Jennifer: Absolutely. It's about just having the grit and the perseverance. 

Tomorrow you're going to be speaking on a panel called Protecting and Restoring Ocean Health. I'm just going to read this summary. It says:

“Oceans and marine fisheries support 90% of the planet's biosphere and holds about 50 times more carbon than the atmosphere. Yet they face unprecedented systemic threats, including ocean acidification, plastic pollution and nutrient contamination.”

This is all bad news, obviously. Now, where's the hope? So, we’re faced with all these challenges, how can we protect and restore ocean health? 

[29:20] Sari: When I first heard about ocean acidification, I think I just had to go outside and cry for half an hour because I hadn't realized that we could save all the fisheries and all the ecosystems. And then still climate change was going to do something. So, I mean, it is very scary. 

But I think we are at the point where there are so many solutions and pieces. The answer is there. Like, we can actually now hold a vision of how we're going to fix it. It's not just this doom and gloom. And I think we all just need to realize that we can do this. 

For all of these problems, there are 10 different solutions. It's just about speeding them up, making them happen, and working across the sectors and industries to get it done. 

So I think I'm hopeful because I know we have a vision of what it will look like and how it will get done. And that's what I hope everybody who's listening and everybody who's on the rollercoaster of feeling hope and despair, which is normal, I think that's a human emotion, is to really hold that vision, be clear about it, and then, find it in your heart, like what lights you up, what keeps you up at night, what's the path that you can make a difference, because we're all here to make a difference and then get it done. 

[30:33] Jennifer: And what keeps you up at night? 

[30:35] Sari: I think really creating a new paradigm of how people think about nature and contributing. 

Like, we go and we shop for all kinds of things that are destructive for the environment. Why wouldn't it be normal to make payments to see these animals? Because it costs money to protect them, to keep these ecosystems intact, to provide our alternatives for the people whose livelihoods used to depend on it, etc. 

So I think there's this whole nature-positive movement which is now really starting to speed up. And I think there's going to be a whole different way of thinking about it. Like, how do we contribute to Earth and biodiversity and the ocean? How do we really give something rather than just take, take, take? 

And I'm excited to provide some tools towards that and see where it goes. 

[31:23] Jennifer: So going from the extractive economy to the restorative or regenerative economy. One thing that actually struck me when I was learning about your work is that it is like you said earlier, it's very similar to deforestation, and it's not as prominent as climate change, because, you know, with climate change, we can feel it. 

So how do we bring more awareness to ocean conservation? 

[31:50] Sari: Oceans have always been disadvantaged by the fact that you can't really see what's happening below the surface and it's also a lot more expensive and difficult to study it. 

So I guess people like me and others who work on the ocean, we have to become a lot better storytellers of what's happening. And there's a lot of technologies now that can help demonstrate what's happening. I just heard at the session earlier that somebody's invented underwater wifi. 

[32:16] Jennifer: Fascinating. I hope that will be used wisely. (chuckles)

[32:20] Sari: I know, not too selfies, please, but documenting what's happening. 

So I think, and also a lot more people are starting to scuba dive. It's one of the fastest growing tourism sectors, it’s growing about 16% per year. And people having access to these biodiversity rich, beautiful areas that we're working hard to protect. 

I think that will, in one session, you will change your view and your behavior once you see how beautiful it is and how spiritually connected you feel when you're underwater and, you know, your senses are different. 

So I'm also a big advocate of people just getting close into the ocean and up and close with the animals that we're talking about, because it's easy to protect what you love and what you feel. 

[33:03] Jennifer: Yeah. I remember now, 10 years ago, we were in the Philippines, and I don't scuba but we did go snorkeling.

And I remember that I swam with this beautiful sea turtle for, like, two minutes, and I thought, oh, my goodness, what a magnificent creature. Because on land, they're so awkward, right? They're so awkward. And in the water, they're like the birds of the ocean because they flap their legs and it was just so beautiful. 

And he allowed me to swim with him and actually I'm the awkward one in the ocean. And I just remember I had this very significant moment where I'm like, wow, it's so beautiful, such a magnificent creature in the water. And it's just so elegant, beautiful. 

[33:53] Sari: Yeah. And they have beautiful energy. They feel like dogs to me when I see them, that loyal nature sometimes. (chuckles)

[34:02] Jennifer: Oh, yeah. There's like that other documentary about My Octopus Teacher that's also very nice. And so I wanted to ask you, who inspires you? Sylvia Earle?

[34:14] Sari: Yeah, of course. I actually like… I know it's a bit of a cliche, but Jacque Cousteau definitely inspired me when I was younger. And then there was a period of Sylvia Earle especially, and because she was a female and all of that. And then I decided that I'm never going to go that deep as she did that. 

[34:34] Jennifer: She’s still scuba diving. 

[34:36] Sari: Yeah, she's very brave. And actually these days, I'm really inspired by the coastal communities and also the leaders and the traditional knowledge that they have about the environment. 

And like having gone on the ground and seeing how these traditional leaders and communities, how they have their ways of protecting marine biodiversity, I'm very inspired by that. 

For example, in Indonesia, some of the communities have closed seasons that they've been traditionally implementing to protect different species. So a lot of these communities have knowledge of how to protect different species. 

It's just kind of when you add the capitalist structure on that and things become difficult. 

[35:16] Jennifer: Well, I think it's very much on trend right now, is that bringing Indigenous leaders or Indigenous wisdom into the conversation.

Because if you go deep into the Amazon, you connect with these people, you understand that they actually understand the land much better than you. And they have this wisdom because they grew up with it and they actually know how to restore nature. 

[35:38] Sari: Yeah. And they have the true spiritual connection with the water and the animals and the earth. Yeah, their ancestors live in the ocean, they communicate with them, they pray for them regularly. 

They still have this connection and a lot of us in the west, we've forgotten about that, but we also need to get that back in order to be able to help Mother Earth. So it's a two-way process. 

[35:59] Jennifer: Do you have a story from the Indigenous community that you want to share here? 

[36:04] Sari: Maybe just I was at the conference in Canada last year, which was a marine conservation conference, and I hadn't been to an international meeting, obviously during the Corona time. 

And there they really involved the First Nations in Canada and all the coastal communities in the conference. And yeah, it was beautiful. Like we would drum and sing for the ocean at the start of the sessions - it was really a lot of space. 

[36:26] Jennifer: Very powerful. 

[36:28] Sari: Yeah, yeah, very powerful. And everybody just immediately has a different energy in the meeting. You know, we are here respecting nature and collaborating and it felt very different to a fishing industry event, put it that way. Actually I feel like I'm never going to another one. 

[36:45] Jennifer: It's depressing, too, right? 

[36:47] Sari: Yeah. I think I found my crowd.

[36:50] Jennifer: Interesting. My friend, every year she holds an interfaith event - there were rabbis there, and there were imams, they were Buddhist monks and Catholic priests. 

And it was really interesting because at the end, this person came from the Amazon and he said, the land where I come from, I don't speak because everyone's spoke, they give a speech. He's like, we sing. 

So he didn't say anything, he just sang for two and a half minutes and everybody in the room was crying. Just like the sound of his voice. 

[37:24] Sari: Yeah. And when you hear the truth and you have an emotional reaction. 

[37:28] Jennifer: Exactly. Absolutely. And then I also want to ask you, what is it like to live in Bali as a resident? Because I've also been there as a tourist, so I'm just curious - I know it's a very spiritual place. 

[37:38] Sari: Yeah. I mean, it's a mixed bag. I love the island. I love Mama Bali. I love the Balinese people. They are great guardians of the land and I respect their culture. 

But then it is hard to live in a mass tourism area and watch the development and the destruction of a lot of things on the way to building tourism infrastructure. So I'm definitely getting a close look at what marine tourism shouldn't look like. 

[38:06] Jennifer: And what are your daily spiritual practices? 

[38:10] Sari: Yeah, so I meditate in the mornings, I pray on my altar, I thank the elements, and then I do a lot of grounding. I have a dog who grounds me by taking me to the beach to walk barefoot. So it's also staying very grounded. 

[38:26] Jennifer: And last but not least, what does the founder spirit mean to you? 

[38:30] Sari: Yeah. So it is finding that spirit that keeps you up at night and wondering, what is it that you're gonna do to make a difference or what can you contribute to? 

I think it's following that pathway and trusting that once you walk in the path that you meant to, you will be supported by the mysteries of the universe on the way. So it's really having that trust that you're doing the right thing and you'll get there in the end. 

[38:58] Jennifer: Well, thank you, Sari. Thank you so much for coming on the show today. And thank you for creating this awareness about ocean conservation. 

[39:04] Sari: Great. Thank you for the opportunity. It's very interesting. 

[39:08] Jennifer Wu: If this podcast has been beneficial or valuable to you, feel free to become a patron and support us on Patreon.com, that is P-A-T-R-E-O-N.com/TheFounderSpirit. 

As always, you can find us on Apple, Amazon and Spotify, as well as social media and our website at TheFounderSpirit.com. 

The Founder Spirit podcast is a partner of the Villars Institute, a nonprofit foundation focused on accelerating the transition to a net-zero economy and restoring planetary health. 

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