 Seacology hopes that during that time the local people grow to respect these resources and ideally progress to a point where they are less dependent on natural resources.According to marine biologist Mark Erdmann, in a worst-case scenario, if the people violate the contract and destroy the habitat, Seacology will have still made a difference in their lives through its low-cost investment, whereas larger conservation organizations might invest large sums of money but through not addressing the immediate needs of the people, if the project fails, both lose that investment and not have helped the community.In one of Seacology's projects, villagers in Fiji refused a $700,000 offer by foreign businessmen to buy one of the islands and signed an agreement that prohibited development for 20 years and established a 10-year no-take fishing reserve encompassing around the island.