Lacadives at ANET

Lacadives has always believed that Scuba Diving should extend beyond leisure and enjoyment, and used as a powerful way of spreading awareness and knowledge about marine ecosystems and life underwater. Over the past 15 years, in Lakshadweep and in Havelock, the instructors at Lacadives have taught people to see and breathe underwater using masks and scuba tanks, and therefore encourage them to open their eyes to the fine balance of the ocean’s ecosystems, the intricate relationships between its inhabitants and the various adaptations that allow them to exist. This longstanding aim has been able to find further focus as a result of the collaborative partnership with ANET since 2010. Lacadives’ primary goal in ANET is to facilitate researchers and students in their projects and education programs related to Marine Ecology, Coral Reef Monitoring and Fisheries science. ANET as a Centre for Island Ecology studies 6 main ecosystems, Coral Reefs being one that Lacadives facilitates the study of. This has made ANET’s tie-up with NCBS extremely valuable, furthering the education of Masters students and facilitating researchers from various institutions studying Coastal and Marine Ecology. We have also trained the Marine Police Force of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and The Department of Environment and Forests in support of ANET’s extensive work with the local administration.
Lacadives is also actively involved in ANET’s education programs for school and college students,taking them diving / snorkeling to the reef followed by presentations, discussions and analyzing the reef, as witnessed in relation to the topics covered in their curriculum. Most of our school modules are combined with dive certification courses, the outcome of which is of great value to students - certifying them as open water divers while simultaneously covering a significant portion of their physics and biology syllabus as part of the dive theory. In our own diving everyday, we also record water temperatures, regeneration, indicator species and composition and reef health, hoping that such information will not only be of value to researchers and scientists but also help recreational divers expand their views on the ocean and marine resources and involve people in the protection and conservation of the immense diversity of the coral reefs in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.