Welcome to the TahitiPetey® Foundation website, my name is Peter "TahitiPetey" Ortmann, Founder, President and Chief Coconut of the Foundation, a privately funded organization based in British Columbia, Canada.
Over the past several years, we have all been through some unbelievable challenges! However, we worked tirelessly to refine and launch our core Foundation programs and projects.
As the global economy collapsed, creating a lack of available credit and declining corporate sponsorships, funding for new programs and projects like we propose became all but impossible. Of course, out of every new challenge comes a new opportunity to rethink your goals and objectives. We did just that!
I am pleased to announce that we are expanding our private invitation only FoundersClubmembership program from 100 members to a maximum 500 members, beginning in September, to focus more on self-funding our programs and projects directly.
Our exclusive FoundersClub Members provide us with a fixed $250 monthly contribution each to accomplish our goals, including our Clear Blue OCEANS plastic waste reduction awareness initiative and to develop our very special Marissa's Reef For Heavenly Helpers project to be built here in Vancouver, BC.
But our private FoundersClub is much, much more! It's part of our long-term funding strategy, and we use a portion of these monthly contributions to play the LottoMAX, one of Canada's most popular weekly lottery games, pool our winnings and share 75% of them with our Members on an equal basis (similar to an employee lotto pool).
You can learn more about the FoundersClub, ourClear Blue OCEANSinitiative and our specialMarissa's Reef For Heavenly Helpers project under their respective tabs on this site. Despite years of program refinements and set-backs, we remain determined to build a powerful new voice for our oceans in an effort to reverse the damaging trends of plastic waste in general, and ocean plastic waste in particular, which is killing millions of sea birds, fishes and marine life annually.
The simple fact is that most people simply have no idea just how bad the plastic waste issue in general has become. As a result, many view the impact of one-time only use of convenience-based plastic products as a non-issue. We aim to change these views!
To better understand just how much we have damaged our oceans over the past 50 years, please watch the short video below featuring Dr. Sylvia Earle, a well-respected marine scientist as she shares some truly unbelievable facts you need to know!
As Ms. Earle says in this video, "NO Blue, No Green" and we certainly agree with her on that view. Our world has many important environmental issues that must be dealt with, but the oceans should be at the top of everyone's list. They represent our largest natural food resource.
The ocean's problems will not correct themselves, it is up to all of us to collectively help make the word BLUE as powerful and as important as the word Green has become today. Not just through the eco-statements of our most popular brands or the false promises of our politicians, but by working together to spread the message of change and becoming more sustainable ourselves.
We can no longer keep our heads in the sand and ignore our oceans or their importance on our lives. We MUST become more aware and address the ocean problems we face if we ever hope to correct them. That is what we hope to help accomplish with the support of our FoundersClub Members and through our Clear Blue OCEANS Initiative.
It's not going to be an easy task, but working together we can effect real change. Help us, help reverse the growing trend of plastic waste in general, and the ocean plastic waste in particular. Use and buy less products packaged in plastic containers, mainly beverage bottles, and demand that our retail stores and manufacturers change their packaging.
Working Together we can and MUST accomplish those goals.