Sea Ranger Service Wins 22 Government Contracts Since 2018, 18 Previously Unoutsourced

The Sea Ranger Service has won 22 government contracts since 2018, 18 of which had never been outsourced before, Time reported. The social enterprise trains recruits 29 and younger to perform marine surveys, hydrographic mapping, shipwreck protection, wind-farm support and seagrass restoration. Wietse Van Der Werf, 43, started the organization after meeting Douglas Tompkins in Antarctica in 2008.

Van Der Werf had planned to ask for €30,000; Tompkins offered €50,000 instead. The funds launched the service, which now pays starting wages of roughly $17 an hour and caps any employee salary at five times the lowest-paid worker. Since 2018 the service has recruited 208 people.

Half have moved into other maritime jobs. Recruits complete a five-week boot camp run by military veterans before assignment to offshore sailing teams or coastal seagrass crews. In one French restoration site coverage grew from 8 square meters to 750 square meters in a year.

The service expanded into the United Kingdom in 2024 and partnered with the Crown Estate. The Crown Estate requires offshore wind developers to meet social-value criteria that include at least 10 percent of their workforce drawn from British youth not in employment, education or training.

Time reported that Van Der Werf received a handwritten note from Sir David Attenborough stating: “Thanks for all you are doing in the battle to care for the natural world.

Van Der Werf plans to attend a nonprofit-management course at Harvard Business School in summer 2026 and aims to franchise the model to other continents.