Virtual Voyage: Fiji

Non-Profit Management

Taylor is an avid scuba diver, paddler, sailor, and all-around ocean lover with a passion for conservation and science communication. She is currently based in Washington DC and leads the Plastics Initiative at the National Geographic Society, which includes conducting ‘Sea to Source’ expeditions to better understand plastic flow, composition, and load in river systems.

Taylor was born in the US, raised in the UK, and has been lucky to be able to work on ocean science and conservation around the world, including Australia, the Caribbean, South Asia, and the South Pacific. Taylor has a BA in Environmental Science with a focus on Marine Ecology from the University of Virginia and a Masters in Marine Biodiversity and Conservation from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego.

Artist - Environmental Technician

Marjan Verschraegen was born in Ghent, Belgium on 28th of May 1975. Now she lives in Foley, Alabama, USA

Marjan studied publicity and three-dimensional art at St.-Lucas academy, Ghent. In 2004 she started studying photography. She was awarded for her entry in the Coke Light & Seduction competition and exhibited in the museum of photography in Antwerp-Belgium.

In 2006 she worked together with Carl Dekeyzer (MAGNUM) on a project of the Flemish Primitives, which was a great experience. After getting her Bachelor degree, she took some time to travel and break limits – Iceland, India, France, Gulf of Mexico…

After visiting The Gulf Of Mexico several times (and having a strong affection with this region), she decided to work on The Oil Spill disaster (2010) and finish her Master Degree (2011). 2012 would be a new beginning. She married singer/songwriter Elaine Petty and moved permanently to Alabama, USA.

Her affection for the environment and going back to “the basics of life”, continued to inspire her and resulted in her present project ‘OCEANTRASH’ – a mix of ‘pure photography’, ‘graphic design’ and ‘performing activism’. ‘OCEANTRASH’ is still finding its shape and will soon set a statement for saving our oceans and bringing global awareness about protecting our natural resources.

Founder of Meaningful Recruitment

As founder of Meaningful Recruitment Katie connects with amazing individuals and organisations that are striving to make a positive social impact in our world. She provides career coaching to help them achieve their aspirations and runs campaigns to help organisations find the talent to help them achieve their visions and solutions that will benefit our communities and our planet.

The plastic crisis comes up time and time again with her clients and through her podcasts and time on the radio, much interest is being raised from her followers on how they can contribute to the solutions. She’s so passionate about bringing about change to rid our oceans of plastic that she’s travelled to Norway and connected with people such as Boyan Slat’s team of Ocean Cleanup in San Francisco.

Circular design and systems thinking

Pippa, the Founder of philo & co, a circular design consultancy, has more than 10 years’ experience within the creative industry working with global design agencies and leading FMCG brands. Pip is driven by the power of design to help re-define ‘business as usual’ and create a more resource efficient economy.

“I believe the answer lies within a Circular Economy and closed loop design, we simply cannot continue consuming at our current trajectory. We have seen for too long the grave consequences it is having on the natural world our existence depends upon.”

Pip is a Circulab certified consultant and plays an active role within her community to help educate and inspire change. She is a mentor to openIDEO and recently became a Climate Reality Leader following training by the Climate Reality Corps, led by Al Gore.

“I’m really looking forward to working with my fellow crew virtually to understand how we can utilise our scientific findings to fuel innovation in up stream solutions.”

Environmental and Safety Engineer

Tünde is an environmental process engineer and a safety engineer, interested in environmental sciences. She considers herself a global citizen, she is from Hungary but living in Austria, and is a mother of 2 kids. Tünde is passionate about protecting our beautiful planet and creating a sustainable world. She would like to use her enthusiasm and skills to explore the impact of plastic pollution, and to communicate and educate findings to different generations, to help everyone understand better how we can live a sustainable life.

Sustainable Interior Designer

Natural Resources Management Specialist

Celine spends her days exploring ways to protect wildlife, forests and the ocean. Hailing from Singapore, Celine works at the World Bank, supporting the governments of Mozambique and Indonesia to tackle marine plastic pollution and move towards a plastics circular economy through policy, partnerships and local innovations. Her other projects aim to maximize the value of natural resources for local communities for their sustainable management. Previously, Celine lived and worked in the Brazilian and Peruvian Amazon, advocating for forest conservation and indigenous rights.

Celine loves diving, backcountry camping and learning languages – and she recently picked up the ukelele. She is excited to exchange ideas on eXXpedition with other strong women leaders and changemakers on solving the plastics problem.

Marine Conservationist

Tharaka is the founder of Ocean Education & Blue Parks Ambassador, Marine Conservation Institute

In 2015 Tharaka Sriram founded the ocean literacy initiative called “Ocean Education”, where she inspires people for Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) and fights for the establishment of a global network of strongly protected MPAs.

She also was chosen to be Blue Parks Ambassador of the Marine Conservation Institute, the organization that globally spearheads research, implementation and advocacy for strongly protected MPAs.

As a linguist and political scientist, she has lived on six of the seven continents. The six languages that she speaks fluently made it easier for her to work at the UN, NGOs, ministries and institutions that focused on the issues of women’s rights, development cooperation, Youth and marine conservation.

Conservation Architect

Nicola spent much of her childhood messing around in boats or on the shore in Norfolk. She is a practicing conservation architect based in London.

She wishes to understand more about our environment at first hand, and share the stories and science.

She approaches the voyage with an open mind, willing and wanting to learn from the Ocean, eXXpedition team, crew and the people we will encounter on land.

Mechanical Engineer/ Urban Affairs Editor

I began my career teaching at the Middle East Technical University in Turkey. I went back to school and got my degree in mechanical engineering at age 36 and joined Truck Operations at Ford.After retirement I returned to Turkey where, working for the World Resources Institute, I founded EMBARQ Turkey: an NGO dedicated to urban transport (now WRI Ross Center Turkey). I served as advisor to the Smart Cities Department of the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality through September 2022. Currently I serve as the Urban Affairs Editor and Livable Cities columnist for the journal EKOIQ. I am also a co-producer and co-host of “The City Belongs to Us” on MedyascopeTV, shaping informed debate on sustainable cities.

Ever since I saw the Blue Marble photo, I have been an advocate for a healthy planet. And my superpower, at age 73, is that I am still excited to be living and learning on this beautiful planet; and fighting to protect it. I am thrilled to be undertaking a new role as “science researcher” on the exxpedition, especially since plastic pollution is of particular interest to me.

Turkey is one of the largest importers of plastic waste, in amounts that exceed its capacity to recycle. And the UK is importing waste to a nation that doesn’t have the capacity to recycle it. The result is out of sight, out of mind for the UK. But for Turkey’s Adana region it is rivers, road sides and landfills with bales of plastic waste that is NOT going to be recycled.

The solution is twofold: nations receiving waste MUST verify their capacity to recycle the incoming waste. And exporting nations should only export waste to nations that have verified their capacity to recycle.

Here’s to fair winds and following seas as we embark upon our voyage.