4Ocean

4ocean

A new company takes on a pressing problem.

When I’m not being a dad or editing Worth, I prefer to be scuba diving. It’s the most relaxing and therapeutic, yet simultaneously challenging and educational, thing I know.

But during the 20 years that I’ve been diving, I’ve witnessed stark changes in the world’s oceans due to climate change, pollution and overfishing. The Great Barrier Reef, site of my first dives, is dying. Grand Cayman, Belize, the Florida Keys—all are over-fished and under assault from warming and increasingly acidic waters. The Gulf of Mexico, where I snorkeled with majestic whale sharks, is being consumed by a massive dead zone so toxic, it kills everything that swims into it. In the summer of 2017, this runoff of fertilizer and pollution was almost 9,000 square miles in size. And through it all runs the problem of plastic, which is filling the world’s oceans and killing their inhabitants.

The situation is dire, especially with an American president who supports fossil fuels and coastal drilling and is slashing EPA restrictions and scientific research. Still, there are glimmers of hope. One for me is a group called 4ocean, a two-year-old for-profit ocean cleanup company founded by a couple of American surfers who found themselves paddling through trash while trying to surf in Bali. 4ocean, whose U.S. headquarters is in Boca Raton, Fla., does two things. Its employees and volunteers actually pull trash from the ocean—about 2.7 million pounds of it as of this writing. But the group, which has worked in 27 countries, also tries to stop the pollution at its source by educating local populations about the impact of plastic pollution on the waters we all depend upon to survive. For $20, you can buy a 4ocean bracelet made of plastic they’ve taken from the ocean and recycled. It’s a small amount of money that has a real impact. 4ocean.com

Scroll to Top