① PAUL'S PERSONAL MOTIVATION
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There's one moment Paul keeps coming back to – not because it makes a good story, but because it opened his eyes – and his heart – in a way nothing else had.
Mossel Bay, South Africa, 2025. A young boy – maybe eight years old – puts on a VR headset that takes him underwater and into contact with the ocean for the very first time. He finds himself in the middle of a pod of dolphins, surrounded by whales, sharks, and rays. Seals circle him curiously. Thirty seconds later, he takes the headset off – eyes shining with genuine wonder. With the feeling of loving something new before he even understood why.
People protect what they love – and they love what they have felt. That's exactly the idea behind HAI-PERFORMANCE: Scan & Protect. We want to spark your curiosity about the ocean and inspire you to contribute to marine conservation. Right here, right now.
"What does lifestyle have to do with marine conservation?!" you might ask. Most people would probably answer: "Nothing at all!" But it doesn't have to be that way! And together, we can change it: our campaign HAI-PERFORMANCE: Scan & Protect creates a connection between what fascinates us and what truly matters.
Because the ocean doesn't just need career conservationists. It needs all of us – people who are fascinated, who genuinely care about protecting it. People who scan a QR code because a car caught their eye – and who, three minutes later, understand why HAI-PERFORMANCE matters in the ocean. The ocean needs every one of us to survive – and we need it far more than most people realize!
"That's why I founded Paul4Sharks. That's why this Taycan is going on tour. And that's why it means so much to me that you're here right now, thinking about the ocean and how to protect it."
FOR THE OCEAN — Paul Zemke
② WHY ARE SHARKS SO CRUCIALLY IMPORTANT?!
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Sharks have existed on this planet for 400 million years – longer than trees, longer than dinosaurs, longer than almost anything we know. They have survived four mass extinctions, adapted to every change the oceans have undergone, and all the while regulated an ecosystem that forms the foundation of all marine life on Earth. Without sharks, the ocean cannot survive! Now, after just a few decades of human impact, 169 of 549 shark species are already listed as at least Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species – with 35 species classified as Critically Endangered and therefore facing extinction.
Why is this happening? More than 100 million sharks are killed every year!
For their fins, served in Asia as a status symbol in shark fin soup (45% of these fins are caught in Europe!). For their meat, often traded under misleading names (Europe is affected too – anyone eating fish & chips today in the UK stands a fair chance of being served shark instead of cod). Or simply as bycatch on longlines and in nets set for something else entirely. This is the systematic collapse of a keystone species, unfolding right before our eyes.
What is being lost here is far more than just another animal. Sharks regulate entire food webs across marine ecosystems – without them, the balance between countless species in the sea begins to shift. Coral reefs are hit hardest of all, as the hotspots of ocean life: covering less than 1% of the seafloor, they are home to a quarter of all known marine species, produce oxygen, protect coastlines from erosion and storms, and secure the food supply of more than a billion people worldwide. But without intact shark populations, reefs lose their resilience – and without reefs, the ocean loses one of its most vital anchors.
This is not a local problem. It is a global tipping point – and we are far closer to it than most people realize!
③ WHAT DOES PAUL4SHARKS STAND FOR?!
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At the age of sixteen, Paul founded his initiative Paul4Sharks – dedicated to protecting sharks and marine ecosystems. What began as awareness work quickly took on new dimensions: just a few months later, Paul was standing on the street with a banner – in the middle of Frankfurt's Zeil – campaigning with the European Citizens' Initiative StopFinningEU to end the shark fin trade in the European Union.
Backed by more than 1.12 million people across Europe, the initiative made it all the way to the European Parliament. Paul attended the public hearing in Brussels – as one of the youngest people in the room, taking a stand: sharks are not a threat – they are the prerequisite for functioning oceans. And we are in the process of losing them. Nearly five years on, Paul is still fighting alongside StopFinningEU to end the shark fin trade in Europe, and has become a Core Team Member of the initiative.
But marine conservation is best learned – and felt – in the field: in 2024, Paul joined the sea turtle conservation programme ARCHELON in Greece, helping to ensure that Greek beaches remain a safe home for loggerhead turtles in the future. A year later, Paul was in South Africa – at the Oceans Research Institute in Mossel Bay, where he observed a wide range of shark species, marine mammals, fish, and birds, collected data, and came to understand what a single species means for an entire ecosystem. Not as a number in a statistic – but as an essential component of a system that does not work without it.
What followed: Paul began his studies at the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management, where he was named President's Scholar 2025 – in recognition of his commitment to ocean conservation!
How's that connected?
In South Africa, Paul didn't just see the concrete impact of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) on preserving entire ecosystems – he experienced it first-hand. And effective marine protected areas cannot exist without scalable financing. That is why Paul is dedicating his studies to the financial instruments used in Blue Finance to fund the protection of our oceans over the long term. Capital is the most powerful lever we have – and it is time to point it in the right direction.
In recognition of his continued commitment, Paul was awarded the Allianz Foundation Jury Prize in the Planet category in late 2025. HAI-PERFORMANCE: Scan & Protect is financed from this prize money!
Paul4Sharks grew out of all of this – out of street activism, fieldwork, academic vision, and the simple refusal to look away!