Four Pacific Island vaka (voyaging canoes) will leave Auckland on Wednesday carrying a conservation message to the Pacific.
The four vessels - made with modern materials but based on traditional design - will retrace historic voyages made by Pacific Island explorers.
The Oceanic director of the Switzerland based International Union for the Conservation of Nature hopes it will draw attention to ecological problems in the region.
The regatta was blessed at a ceremony in Bayswater Marina on Auckland's North Shore on Sunday.
The vaka will travel to French Polynesia, the Cook Islands, Samoa, Tonga and Fiji.
Taholo Kami, from the Switzerland-based International Union for the Conservation of Nature, hopes the voyage will draw attention to the ecologic degradation in the region, such as dying coral reefs and shrinking fish populations.
The captain of the New Zealand team, marine biologist Magnus Danbolt, a marine biologist says there is significant noise pollution in the Pacific from commercial ships while the vaka make no sound.
Mr Danbolt says research is just beginning into how this noise pollution degrades the environment.
For Rob Hewett, the former navy diver who survived 72 hours in the water lost at sea, the voyage is a chance to reconnect to traditional ways of doing things.
Mr Hewett says every participant will learn about the ecology and traditional navigation.
