In this week’s Community Spotlight, Project AWARE catches up with Elaine Brett, a scuba professional rallying her community to tackle plastic.

Tell us about your passion for ocean conservation.

I have always cared for the environment but felt there wasn't much, as an individual, that I could do to help. Everything felt like it wasn't enough.

When I began managing Master Divers on Koh Tao, Thailand in 2009, I realized a shift in my responsibilities. I began by making small environmental changes around the dive center. These had a great influence on others and their choices. I changed the way the business was run and put conservation at the heart of our operations.

Fast forward to now and I strongly believe that individuals can truly make the difference. If you can point people in the right direction, not only do they follow your lead, they go beyond and start to create their own positive change.

Why and when did you get involved with Project AWARE?

I first became involved with Project AWARE when I became a PADI Instructor.

When I started managing Master Divers, I made the decision to support Project AWARE within the business by encouraging students to participate in their programs. The real change came a few years ago now when we started working more closely with the Project AWARE team.

What are some issues that are affecting your local dive site or favorite underwater areas?

Since first moving to Koh Tao in 2003, I've noticed a dramatic decline in the number of sharks. Gone are the days when I had the great pleasure of diving with bull, grey reef and leopard sharks in the waters of Koh Tao. While this is very sad, we do still see many whale and black tip reef sharks and we're working hard to protect them.

We also have a big problem with single-use plastic. Around the world, the production and use of single-use plastics have boomed in recent years. Living on a small island, it is very apparent that this is now a huge problem. Although I have been able to control single-use plastics within our dive center and cafe, I have seen the need to influence and help the rest of our community.

This Earth Day, a number of eco-leaders on the island rallied businesses to commit to being single-use plastic-free with a deadline for commitment and implementation June 8, World Oceans Day. We held an island-wide land and underwater cleanup, collected data through Dive Against Debris and kick-started a donation drive to build a community-wide project for recycling and supplying alternatives to single-use plastic. We raised over 400,000 THB. And we removed over 500kg's of rubbish from our ocean with all twenty dive sites removing, recording and reporting data to Project AWARE. Earth Day has now truly become a day where our community come together to help keep our paradise island beautiful.

What Project AWARE programs have you participated in? Tell us about your work.

We teach Project AWARE's Specialty's and have adopted a dive site to regularly monitor trash at one of our dive sites.

A few years ago we created a video for Project AWARE called Shark Life. We had lots of fun doing that!

One of our PADI Divemaster's Gene Giraudeau successfully swam 23 km around the island of Koh Tao with us as her support crew in December of 2012. With the success of that swim, we went on to make the same swim the following year as a relay team, raising over $5,500 for Project AWARE's FINathon and in 2014 Gene took on a solo swim from Koh Phangan to Koh Tao, a massive distance of 43km and raising a further $5,705 for Project AWARE's FINathon.

What has been the highlight of your Project AWARE experience?

Each and every time I work with Project AWARE on an environmental issue I am more assured of their hard work and dedication. The most recent are when I asked for assistance for our Earth Day event for 2017. They came through once again and because of them, our underwater clean-up was bigger, more successful and organized than before. Thank you again to the team!

What is the most important thing you tell others about Project AWARE?

Project AWARE is an organization dedicated to mobilizing the divers to protect our ocean planet. Over the years I have learned they are always there to lend a hand. They want to help with any projects you are trying to achieve. So don't try to do it alone, reach out to the team and they will be more than happy to help. 

From all of us at Project AWARE a special thank you to the following dive centers on Koh Tao who joined and worked togethr on the Earth Day actions: Apnea Total, Aqua Tao,  Asia Divers, Bans Diving Resort, Big Blue, Buddha View, Carabao, Coral Grand Divers, Crystal Dive, French Kiss, Good Time Adventures, Koh Tao Divers, Koh Tao Scuba Club, Master Divers, New Heaven, Phoenix, Pura Vida, Scuba Shack, Simple Life Divers, and Sunshine Divers.