Responsible and sustainable diving. 100% committed to our oceans

Responsible and sustainable diving. 100% committed to our oceans.

Our love, respect and commitment to the sea. What we do at SDDC and what you can do to protect it.

We are divers and the ocean is our passion and our lifestyle. It is also our school and our office.

The reefs of Bali are so beautiful. They are super healthy, colourful and full of life. It is the responsibility of each of us to keep them that way. Take care of them, respect them and even more, improve them.

It is a pleasure for us to share our passion with all of you. It is our priority to teach people not only to dive but also to respect, care for and love the sea.

Responsible and sustainable diving. What do we do at SDDC to achieve it?

WE CHECK

When booking your dives with SDDC you must fill out a form with your diving experience. Your diving certification, number of dives, and when was the last time you dived.

We require all divers to do a check dive when they come diving with us for the first time. We want to make sure that you are properly weighted and can perfectly control your buoyancy and maintain a correct posture so as not to damage the reefs and be able to enjoy your dives in a totally safe way.

EDUCATE AND CORRECT

As professionals, it is our responsibility to correct the weight you need so that you can maintain a correct position and improve your air consumption.

In the event of any deficiency that we may observe, we will discuss it with you individually and we will give you the guidelines and help to correct it.

DON’T CROWD THE DIVE SITES

At SDDC we work exclusively privately or in small groups. We do not overcrowd the dive sites or mix divers of different levels in the same group.

In this way, we minimize the stress that we can cause to the reefs and at the same time we make sure that you can enjoy your dives to the fullest and in a totally safe and fun way.

WE INFORM

Before each dive, we inform in the briefing about the specific conditions of the dive site as well as the marine life. At the same time, we remind all customers of the guidelines to be a responsible divers.

Responsible and sustainable diving. Guidelines

• Control your buoyancy and only do dives appropriate to your experience and training. Be especially careful when flapping your fins and keep the distance necessary not to touch or damage the reefs.
• Take only photos, souvenirs and debris. Leave only bubbles. Marine life belongs to the sea and that is where it should be. Do not touch it or take anything with you. On the other hand, nobody likes to see plastic or garbage in the sea. Your BCD has pockets where you can store any garbage you find during your dives.
• Protect marine life. The best way to interact with marine life is by observing it from a distance. Interact only passively. These means do not touch, do not feed, do not chase or even worse do not ride any sea creatures.

Responsible and sustainable diving. What do we do at SDDC besides this?

• Underwater and beach clean-ups. To us, every day is the day of the oceans. Whenever we go to the beach and on each of our dives, if we see garbage, we collect it and take it to the appropriate container on land.
• Collaborate with organisations like example Trash Hero Candidasa and Rice for Plastic.
• Spread the word. We share our experiences on social media, with our friends and family. This helps each individual to become aware of the responsibility that each one of us has and how we all can help.
• With our actions, we act as role models for the rest of the diving community.

We work with the local community, we support and respect it.

A good example is that we use the traditional Balinese boats, jukungs, to access the local dives. Yes, it is true, they are smaller and slower than speed boats. But think about it. The dives in the islands of Candidasa are only 10 minutes away in Jukung, perhaps by speed boat, it will take you half the time. But these few minutes can make a big difference in the community, in your experience and in the environment.

Benefits for the local community. Responsible and sustainable diving

• Improvement of their working conditions and salary. Before working with the divers, local boats were used for fishing. By working with us, their working conditions and salary have increased considerably
• Education. By working directly with divers, the Balinese learn to respect and care for the sea. Many fishermen were not aware of, for example, the dangers of feeding marine life and the damaging impact of plastics and garbage on beaches and in the sea.

Benefits for our clients:

• By using smaller jukungs, each group of divers has their own boat. This allows us to choose the right dive site for each client, instead of forcing everyone to do the same dive at the same time due to a lack of resources.

• Less crowded dive sites.
• Sailing in a jukung is an exotic experience that you can only live in Indonesia. Navigation is calmer and quieter than in a speed boat. This gives you the opportunity to enjoy the scenery, take photos, and chat with the other divers as you move between the different dive sites.

Benefits for the environment:

• Less impact and stress on reefs
• Less noise and environmental pollution
• Reduction of fishing and therefore protection of marine parks

Benefits for the dive center:

Working with the local community we do not have one boat but many boats to be able to correctly plan the dives for each of our clients.

If at any given time a boat needs maintenance, the community itself makes sure to provide another boat so as not to interrupt our program.

Can we access all the dive sites with local boats?

The answer is no. We only use jukungs for local dives, for example in Candidasa, Amed, and Padangbai.

But when we plan dives in Nusa Penida, then we do need bigger boats with more power to be able to cross between islands. What we do is that all Candidasa dive centers work together. In these cases, different dive centers share the same speed boat. Each center takes its group with its own guide, but we share the same boat to minimize pollution and also the costs for our clients.

Responsible and sustainable diving. And you, how can you help?

• Be an eco-tourist. Remember that Bali is just an island with few resources. Here there is no recycling plant, only waste separation. What cannot be recycled or processed is incinerated or buried.
• So think before you act. Maybe you can take your garbage back to your country, with more resources than here, where there is no way to process it. A good idea for example is to take your batteries and razor blades back with you.
• Make efficient use of water and energy. As you already know, resources in Bali are limited. You can help with small actions such as turning off the air conditioning when you are not in your room or choosing to take a shower instead of filling the bathtub each time.
• Become a debris activist. Perhaps on your vacation, you have time to participate in underwater and beach clean-ups that different organizations program. But if you don’t have time, you can take a few moments during your dives or your walks on the beach to collect garbage that you may find. Every little help counts!
• Reduce, reuse, recycle. Always carry a recycling bag with you and say no to single-use plastic bags and also to plastic straws.
• Make responsible seafood choices. Ask the local community. Choose sustainable species and refuse to buy protected ones. Remember that if there is no buyer, the market will disappear.
• Share your experiences. Divers are ambassadors and front-line spectators of what is happening in our oceans. By sharing our experiences with our friends we help raise awareness throughout the community.
• Also, you can donate to organisations that protect and care for our oceans. We can recommend Trash Hero Candidasa and also Plastic for rice.

Would you like to dive with us in Bali?