56 Wietse van der Werf Sea Ranger Service Mission The Sea Ranger Service works with an innovative social business model to train young unemployed people in becoming Sea Rangers and restore ocean biodiversity at scale. The model has been piloted and validated in close collaboration with the Dutch government since 2016. The Sea Ranger Service is focussed on building zero-emission ships to ensure its service is provided in a clean and cost-effective way. This then offers a unique offshore capacity to accelerate the scale of seagrass, coral, and oyster bed restoration significantly. The Sea Ranger Service is on a mission to regenerate 1 million hectares of seascape while training 20.000 unemployed youths towards maritime careers - by 2040. Its impact is measured by new jobs created, biodiversity restored, and CO2 absorbed through regenerated seagrass. Impact & 4 returns Inspiration By training and employing young people as Sea Rangers, the Sea Ranger Service builds up the workforce to restore oceans at scale. Additionally, the Sea ranger Service ’s strength is its ability to build unusual broad coalitions for ocean conservation work. For instance, the Sea Ranger Service has partnerships with maritime companies, government agencies, veteran organizations, shipbuilding firms and youth workers. The large community of stakeholders offers genuine hope for a broad societal shift towards improved ocean conservation. Financial Capital The Sea Ranger Service conducts contracted offshore work. It leverages its income to attract further investment and scale up its ability to Natural Capital After 5 years of developing three new industry standards, necessary to carry out cost-effective offshore conservation work, the Sea Ranger Service will start its first seagrass restoration pilot in 2021. expand ship capacity for ocean conservation and ecological restoration work. All profits are being reinvested back into the initiative’s work, ensuring the Sea Ranger Service’s offshore services benefit ocean health at an increasing rate. Fortunately, Sea Ranger Service’s extensive business model has managed to generate revenue from governmental agency contracts, as well as offshore commercial assignments. This income can - through banking finance- then generate higher capital investment. Social Capital The Sea Ranger Service has trained 78 young people so far and employed a third of them in a full-time capacity. This impact will greatly increase as the model scales to other countries.
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