The Reef-World Foundation is a UK-registered charity which operates internationally to inspire, empower and support governments, businesses, communities and individuals to protect the marine environment; in particular, coral reefs and related ecosystems.
It’s a small but tight-knit team; all five members of full-time staff are divers who love coral reefs and are passionate about protecting them for the benefit of local communities, visitors and future generations.
Leading the team are directors Chloe and JJ who met while studying marine biology at Newcastle University. After graduation, they visited Asia to get some tropical experience in the field and qualify as Dive Masters. Little did they know, during that trip they would meet Anne Paranjoti (née Miller) who founded The Reef-World Foundation and their journey with Reef-World would begin.
At the time, Anne was running environmental courses for tourists. Although eco-tourism is very popular now, it was rare at the time and Anne was a pioneer within the local diving industry. When she met Chloe and JJ, Anne was ready to leave Asia and move back to the UK and had been looking for someone to hand the Reef-World baton over to – and the rest, as they say, is history.
Founded in 1999, Reef-World’s vision is to preserve coral reefs around the world by making sustainable diving and snorkelling the social norm. It does this through Green Fins – the charity’s flagship programme which was developed in collaboration with the UN Environment (UNEP) and is now active in 10 (soon to be 11!) countries around the world: Antigua and Barbuda, Dominican Republic, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Maldives, Palau, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. As international coordinator of the initiative, Reef-World leads its technical development globally on behalf of UNEP.
Through Green Fins, Reef-World is leading the way in helping dive operators reduce their negative environmental impact and making sustainable diving the social norm, globally.
