Mote & Enzymedica: A Natural Culture of Giving

By Ryan G. Van Cleave  |  Opening photo by Nancy Guth

A local company’s commitment to sustainability is helping the vitally important work of Mote Marine’s coral reef restoration project.

In a world where people worry that the almighty dollar wins out every time, it’s always impressive when a story emerges that runs counter to that capitalism-at-all-costs mentality. And that’s the situation with Enzymedica, a company that’s devoting a portion of its new Aqua Biome fish oil supplements to help the ocean. More specifically, they’re interested in supporting Mote Marine Laboratory & Aquarium’s coral reef restoration project in the Florida Keys. To that end, they donated more than $65,000 in 2019, and the hope is that they’ll be able to support Mote even more substantially in 2020.

What makes Enzymedica different than other companies is how their workplace culture and overall philosophy includes a commitment to sustainability. Its President and CEO, Scott Sensenbrenner, says that as a company, they feel it’s their mission and obligation to give back. “At Enzymedica, we provide products that are sourced from nature. It is inherently in our nature to want to give back to the planet which is so tremendously important to our business. Because we depend so much on our planet, being stewards of the environment is tremendously important.”

He explains that sometimes, being good stewards of the environment means doing “a little bit more” when it comes to making environmentally conscious decisions. For example, their headquarters is LEED-Gold certified, their company is certified carbon neutral, and they’re partially powered by a solar panel array. “These are decisions we’ve made,” Sensenbrenner says, “and we know that they will be part of the legacy that we leave behind.”

You can’t talk about ocean health without talking about coral reefs, and there’s no mistaking the situation—their future is in jeopardy. The solution is immediate, focused human intervention like Mote is doing. To put it plainly, we’ve pushed our corals to the edge of functional extinction in the Florida Keys. It’s hard to believe, but we’re now down to 2% of coral cover—that’s so low that even if we eliminate all future stressors such as climate change, coral disease, overfishing, and ocean acidification, the reefs won’t be able to recover on their own. We’re past the point where Mother Nature can fix the issue on her own.

1% of the world’s oceans are coral reefs, but that 1% supports more than 25% of all marine life, which translates into feeding more than half a billion people per year. They also provide important ecosystem services for humans, protecting our coastline from wave action and storms, providing novel medicinal compounds, and supporting economies worldwide. Florida’s coral reef is estimated to provide over $8 billion to the state economy and 70,000+ jobs. 

Enzymedica knows that Mote’s science-based restoration efforts are necessary if we want to recover Florida’s reef. The good news is that they’ve found a great partner in Mote, an organization that is dedicated to coral reef research and restoration.

Mote’s Public Relations manager, Stephannie Kettle, notes that Mote has been able to raise over 70,000 coral fragments and outplant over 25,000 fragments at their Florida Keys facility this past year. Since the coral has been genetically screened for signs of resiliency to warm water temperatures, acidification, and disease, these outplantings are far more likely to survive for generations to come and make a real difference in terms of the future health of the reef.

Here’s the reality—the scale of restoring Florida reef’s is so grand that one organization cannot do it alone. That’s why the support of companies like Enzymedica is so vital to what Mote is doing. Their financial support means that Mote can grow more corals, outplant them, and find more genetic strains of resilient coral for Mote’s restoration efforts. Kettle adds that every bottle of Aquabiome, and the Aquabiome website, contains information about threats to coral reefs and Mote’s restoration efforts, supporting Mote’s mission of educating the public on the threats our oceans face.   

“As Mote seeks to significantly increase the number of corals we are able to outplant in the Florida Keys, we are energized by our new partnership with Enzymedica,” said Dr. Michael P. Crosby, Mote’s President and CEO. “Educational material with each bottle of Enzymedica’s Aqua Biome will help the public learn more about the importance of coral reefs, and proceeds from sales of this dietary supplement will provide donations to Mote in support of our coral restoration initiative. As two organizations based in Florida, Mote and Enzymedica are intertwined with Florida’s natural marine resources, and we applaud Enzymedica’s sense of environmental stewardship. Buy a bottle, save a reef!” 

Sensenbrenner sums up the reason behind the Enzymedica and Mote partnership, saying, “Mote has something special—a real synergy between being a purpose-driven organization, and having exceptional staff who have created groundbreaking technologies. At Enzymedica, we research the link between nature and human health. Mote is driving home the link between the ocean and the health of our planet. For us, this is a perfect partnership, and we’re proud to share it with each other, our families, and our customers.” 

For more information on Mote Marine Laboratory, please visit www.mote.org or call 941.388.4441. For more information on Enzymedica, please visit www.enzymedica.com.