Mark ‘Crowley’ Russell visits the Living Seas Foundation in Padangbai, Bali, a community conservation project benefitting from TUI’s tourist outreach.
Scuba diving eco-tourism has seen a marked rise over the last few decades, something broadly welcomed by the dive industry but, perhaps, unevenly distributed across it.
Operators advertising themselves as eco-resorts are often the most highly priced exclusive retreats, and while more mainstream dive centres are often keen to promote their green credentials, the reality of slender margins and tight budgets means that they are doing their best, but appreciate that most holidaymakers prefer to dive and let other people do the planet-saving.
There is no shortage of conservation-based initiatives that divers can get involved with, but participation is usually from within local clubs and communities rather than tourists on holiday.
Indeed, much eco-tourism doesn’t involve the divers actually doing anything other than turning up and – for a fee – agreeing to try not to adversely affect the local environment.
These are not necessarily bad things. Some of Indonesia’s top-end resorts charge high fees for a comfortably green vacation, but it is a business model that has seen Southeast Sulawesi’s Wakatobi, for example, create a virtually pristine marine reserve through its promotion of sustainable diving.
In more populous resorts, initiatives like the Green Fins programme for environmental best practice have become a global phenomenon over the last decade.
Anything that helps protect the ocean is surely a good thing, but practical participation is based around individual operators promoting the various programmes, and much of that remains within the niche of dive tourism.
In recent years, however, some of the big tour companies have been taking an interest in flexing their green credentials. Among them is TUI, one of Europe’s largest tourism companies which, in 2016, launched an initiative to bring eco-tourism towards the mainstream of regular, budget-conscious travellers.
The change is driven through the company’s charitable arm, the TUI Care Foundation, partly funded by the TUI Group but an otherwise independent not-for-profit foundation.
There are currently over 80 projects in more than 30 countries being funded by the group, run through four sectors which cover community education, culture, local farming and land restoration programmes, and the Marine Conservation Initiative.
Within the Marine Conservation sector is TUI Turtle Aid, Destination Zero Waste, and the TUI Sea the Change Programme, of which the Bali-based Livingseas Foundation is a beneficiary.
The Livingseas Foundation
Originally founded as a dive operation by Singaporean Leon Boey, Living Seas began to take shape as a conservation initiative in 2015, when Boey opened up a dive business in Indonesia.
Concerned at the rapid loss of local coral, he and his team began experimenting with different materials to create an artificial reef substrate.
With little to do during the downturn caused by the global pandemic, what started out as an interesting side project morphed into a charitable organisation committed to coral reef restoration.
Based in Padangbai, approximately 50 km northeast of Denpasar along Bali’s southern coast, the key to Boey’s programme has been the development of ‘reef stars’, hexagonal steel structures coated with resin and sand to which coral fragments are attached.
A pontoon has been installed just outside Padangbai’s harbour where, under the supervision of his trained team, visitors can affix their fragments to a star with a personalised name tag and then dive or snorkel over their newly-laid contributions.
Community conservation
One of the key aspects of both TUI’s Sea the Change programme, and Boey’s Living Seas Foundation is that they combine community outreach and education with the reef conservation initiative.
Since active restoration work began in 2020, 24 Indonesian locals have been trained to dive, snorkel and transplant the coral fragments. To date, around 8,000 square metres of a planned 5 hectare (50,000 sq m) project has already been restored.
To support the community and conservation work, Boey’s project is now an experience available for sale within TUI Musement, the platform through which TUI markets its in-destination experiences.
Although the initiative might remain, in context, something of a niche activity, it now occupies a niche on a mainstream global tourism platform, and that is something of a first for coral reef restoration.
‘I prefer to refer to ourselves as doing restorative tourism instead of eco-tourism,’ says Boey, explaining the philosophy that underpins his project. ‘The latter term generally seems to be just looking around at nature and hopefully creating less of a negative impact than traditional tourism.
‘However, there is always going to be a negative impact from travel. A better way forward would be, while on holiday, to do something that positively benefits the land or ocean. Such as planting a tree, farming some vegetables, or planting some coral.
‘I believe that’s the only way we can leave a place slightly better than it was before we got there. Hopefully, this action helps to “offset” the negative impact of your being there in the first place.’
Boey also does not shy away from the fact that, to maintain the reef restoration project and its associated community benefits, he needs to stay in business.
To stay in business, he needs to sell his product to customers, and although his contribution to TUI’s global income is a minute percentage, TUI is a successful, multibillion- dollar global company because it profits from the sale of holiday experiences.
The business of conservation is often overlooked, and while cynics might be tempted towards phrases such as ‘corporate greenwashing’, there really is little downside to the overall concept.
‘I do think it’s good business, putting this altogether,’ says Boey. ‘I like to joke that I’m in the business of restoration. People pay us for the reef star structures – which we make ourselves, so we can control the cost – and for the learning and experience of planting corals on them.
‘This means that the more people that come, the bigger and better the reef becomes,’ he adds. ‘All our employees prosper and get a sustainable income, the community gets the funds from accommodation, food, and transport, and the ocean benefits from more corals being planted and the ecosystem rebounding.
‘Tourists also benefit from seeing a beautiful reef, as well as the positive vibes from helping contribute to it directly. In fact, many other dive centres now use our site, where once nobody would ever dive on that site because it was all rubble. ‘I like to call that the quadruple win, where everyone, including and especially nature, wins.’
For more about the Livingseas Foundation and how to get involved, visit www.livingseasfoundation.org. For more from TUI and it’s conservation work head to tuicarefoundation.com.
- Intuitive Reef Restoration – how TUI and Living Seas repair Bali’s reefs - 30 July 2026
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