1 · Position
Andrew and Marit Miners first saw Batbitim in 2005, its beach strewn with the carcasses of finned baby sharks. They leased the surrounding sea from the community, built a resort on the island and registered the foundation in 2011 as the resort’s non-profit extension. It employs some forty-nine people including eighteen salaried rangers at three stations.
2 · Why it is in the Library
The mechanism is the point: the community leases the reef to the foundation rather than selling it, so the tenure remains theirs and the protection is contractual. The resort donates USD 100 for every guest and employs over 120 people, decoupling local income from extraction. It is the most legible statement anywhere of the claim that tourism can outbid fishing.
3 · Candour
A privately funded marine reserve depends on the private funding continuing, and on a lease that must be renewed. Ranger patrols on this scale are enforcement carried out by a company in waters it also profits from, which is a governance question the arrangement does not resolve. Staff and area figures are the foundation’s own.