Founded in 1991, it began with the work of ethnobotanist Paul Alan Cox, who researched tropical plants and their medicinal value in the village of Falealupo in Samoa during the mid-1980s.

With the help of his friends and family, Cox secured the funds within six months, later earning him and the village chief, Fuiono Senio, the Goldman Environmental Prize for their efforts.

Word spread throughout the islands, and with increasing demand for similar projects, Cox, along with Bill Marré and Ken Murdock, decided to form Seacology and expand their work internationally.

Because of the high risk of extinction for island fauna and the decline in coral reef ecosystems, Seacology's primary focus is projects in which villagers sign contracts under which they agree to help protect either terrestrial or marine habitat for a specified time in return for new buildings or services.

At the same time, they had helped construct new facilities and provided programs including educational materials, vital medical services, and environmental training.

Seacology was founded in 1991 by ethnobotanist Paul Alan Cox and his wife Barbara in 1991 resulting from his efforts to preserve 30,000 acres (120 km2; 47 sq mi) of rainforest outside the village of Falealupo on the island of Savai'i in Samoa.

His aim was to find a cure for metastatic breast cancer, which had claimed the life of his mother, scientist Rae G. Cox, earlier the previous year.

[3][4] Prostratin was isolated in a concoction made from the bark of the local mamala tree (Homalanthus nutans) and shared with him by a traditional healer named Epenesa Mauigoa, who used it to treat hepatitis.

[3] Cox set up royalty agreements with the National Cancer Institute and Brigham Young University to ensure that the Samoans will share in any commercial development of the drug.

Despite initial skepticism, Cox addressed the assembled village chiefs and convinced the high orator, Fuiono Senio, who then helped persuade the rest of the elders.

Verne Read, a businessman and financial supporter of Bat Conservation International,[10] subsequently assumed payments on the mortgage for the school until the completed funds could be raised.

[5][11] Ken Murdock, founder of the herbal company Nature's Way, and Rex Maughan, owner of Forever Living Products, together with Cox, his family, and students funded the construction of the school[5][12] and repaid the loggers for their $20,000 advance.

[16] Prior to that, Murdock, who later subsequently became Seacology's President, suggested continuing their work by seeking out more villages with which they could exchange projects for marine and forest reserves.

[5] As demand among island villages grew, Bill Marré, a business consultant and executive coach who later became a member of the board of trustees and the Chairman's Advisory Council, suggested establishing a nonprofit organization to continue their work.

[16] He suggested the name "Seacology" to reflect the organization's focus on conservation both terrestrial and marine habitats in islands, and helped cofound the nonprofit in 1991, along with Cox and Murdock.

Together with his assistant Rita Despain, Marré helped advertise Seacology by giving lectures at schools and universities, visiting other island nations, and writing articles about the work for the local media.

[6] The walkway has since become one of Samoa's leading tourist attractions,[3] and was yielding an average of $1,000 each month for the community in 2001—bringing in more money than the villagers would have earned from selling their forest.

Silverstein had been inspired by the work Cox had done in Samoa, and agreed to take the position of Executive Director of Seacology under the condition that the office be relocated to within walking distance of his house.

[27][28] Seacology is a nonprofit organization that works to preserve both island habitats and cultures by exchanging services for local assistance and cooperation with conservation efforts.

[16] According to its mission statement on its website, "Seacology searches for win-win situations where both the local environment is protected and islanders receive some tangible benefit for doing so.

[32] Scientific surveys have shown that coral reefs, which surround many islands, are declining rapidly due to climate change, dynamite and cyanide fishing, and marine pollution.

[9] To save island habitats around the world, Seacology staff initiate projects by first holding meetings with local villagers to determine their needs.

[40] That same year, they collaboratively funded the creation of a nursery run by the non-governmental organization (NGO) Azafady in Madagascar to raise 3,000 seedlings of the endangered palm Dypsis saintelucei.

[49] On the island of Kendhoo, part of the Baa Atoll in the Maldives, Seacology paid $30,000 in 2003 to build a kindergarten in exchange for a ban on harvesting endangered sea turtle eggs, which the government did not prohibit.

[42] In 2015, Seacology launched its largest-ever project, a $3.4 million initiative to protect all of Sri Lanka's remaining mangrove forests and restore many degraded ones.

Through Sri Lanka–based NGO Sudeesa[55] (also known as the Small Fishers Federation of Lanka), Seacology is funding a significant expansion of that organization's existing microloan and job-training programs for impoverished coastal women.

The training is designed in part to give low-income women in these communities alternatives to harvesting mangroves, a subsistence activity that has contributed to the forests' degradation.

Similar to the one in Sri Lanka, the initiative focuses on mangrove conservation, but differs in approach by prioritizing environmental education and awareness, and supporting ecotourism and other sustainable livelihood activities.

These trips include destinations like Fiji, and offer both unusual travel opportunities and a means to help improve the quality of life for the indigenous people.

[85] Among the members are researcher and Pulitzer Prize winner Jared Diamond, entomologist oceanographer Sylvia Earle, and prior to his death, evolutionary biologist E. O.