A Legacy Project:
Uniting, Educating and Inspiring Our Community to Love and Protect Our Oceans 

OUR PURPOSE

Dedicated to raising much-needed funds and awareness for organisations doing incredible work and who are making a difference in protecting and preserving our Australian Waters.

OUR VISION

• Our vision is aligned with our core values.

• The Sapphire Project aims to unite, educate and inspire our communities, to love and protect our oceans and financially support those organisations making an impact in protection and conservation. This underpins everything we do and provides the guiding principles to our behaviour and the relationships we have with our partners and donors.

OUR VALUES

• We celebrate those making a real difference in ocean conservation.

• We align our relationships with those charity partners who have a shared commitment to protecting the environment and demonstrating impact and accountability

• Our people and our ambassadors are obsessed with telling the ocean conservation story.

• We think big and focus on work that makes a difference. 

• We take our relationships with our sponsors, donors and supporters seriously. 

• We are transparent, accountable and act with integrity. 

OUR OBJECTIVES

• Inspire a swell of philanthropic support for ocean conservation in Australia.

• Our goal is that the Sapphire Project becomes the trusted destination to discover all the work being done in this important environmental space.

THE HOW

Bring together key stakeholders and key donors to celebrate United Nations World Ocean Day with a gala fundraising event in Sydney connecting donors to those organisations making a difference.

OUR PEOPLE

We are a diverse group of volunteers from all walks of life sharing a passion for ocean sustainability and conservation in Australia. Building on the legacy of the international conservationist and philanthropist, Susan Rockefeller, we work together to further create awareness for the much-needed funding of our oceans. Led by Hayley Baillie and Ryan Gollan, our team includes Ian Thorpe, Susan Wynne, Brioney Prier, Bianca Rinehart, Chong Chua, Kate Champion, Ellie Aitken and Luke Hepworth.

OUR AMBASSADORS

• Our ambassadors reflect our values and embrace our vision. Where possible we will leverage their profiles to communicate the Sapphire messaging.

• Our current ambassadors include Ian Thorpe AM, Jarrod Scott, Madison Stewart, Ky Hurst, Laura Wells, Paul de Gelder, Julia Wheeler, Matt Draper, Ace Buchan, Sam Bloom, Neil Perry and Billy Bain.

HOW DONATION FUNDS ARE MANAGED

The Sapphire Project does not receive any funds from ticket sales or donations. We have proudly partnered with The Great Barrier Reef Foundation as our payment processor to administer and distribute raised funds with no administration costs. All supported organisations are registered charities (DGR1) in Australia and are eligible to accept tax-deductible donations. The foundation will provide tax-deductible receipts for all donations for Australian tax purposes. Donations of $2.00 or more are tax deductible in Australia.

OUR CHARITY PARTNERS 

Objective - Attract and showcase quality charities to inspire the Sapphire Community and donors to be engaged and to give. 

We are focused on supporting Australian-based ocean conservation charities and each year we will select up to four partners.  The area of focus will be either geographically or themed-based. In our inaugural year, we supported work on the Great Barrier Reef and will continue this support each year with a percentage of our raised funds going to the GBRF as the custodians for the jewel of our nation's marine ecosystems.

The Charity Sub-Committee will provide a recommendation on the year’s focus taking into consideration the United Nations World Oceans Day messaging.  Our chosen charities need to align and support the messaging as well as demonstrate accountability and impact. The Sapphire Project looks favourably upon the following factors for funding:

• Conservation/restoration

• Scalability

• Addressing climate change

• Projects that may not otherwise attract funding

• Impact

• Equity

• Urgency

• First Nations

For subsequent years, a wide variety of Australian geographic and ocean themes are considered.

FRAMEWORK & CRITERIA FOR SELECTION OF CHARITIES

A charity sub-committee made up of at least two committee members is to recommend a group of ocean partners that Sapphire will raise funds each year in our chosen area of focus. Ocean partners must be Australian-run organisations with DGR1 status.  Their objective is to provide scientific, environmental or conservation programs that create a positive impact on our ocean resources.

We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.