Oceans dying

Over three quarters of our planet are covered by the oceans. Their biodiversity is unmatched and they contain over 80 percent of all life on earth, mostly unexplored. Millions of people worldwide are depending on the oceans for their daily livelihoods. More and more all this is endangered because of ignorance and a global lack of management.
As a keen diver, this post is particularly important to me. Watch the video below, shot by my good friend and diving buddy Ferdi (check his blog at http://www.deep6pixels.com/) in Anilao, Philippines.

Portulano Diving Scenes July & August 2009 from Ferdi on Vimeo.

Is it not that beautiful? Well we are managing to destroy this calming, beautiful heaven full of life.
The map below shows that only very small remote areas close to the poles are not affected by us. A recent study which has mapped the total human impact on the seas has revealed "that no area is unaffected by human influence and that a large fraction (41%) is strongly affected by multiple drivers". The most severely affected areas are the North Sea, South and East China Seas, Carribean, Mediterranean, Red Sea, the Gulf, the Bering Sea, the East Coast of North America and the Western Pacific.

We create waste for any activity we perform and we dump it in the ocean. Tons of plastic are floating in our seas, creating patches in some cases, larger than the States.

The North Pacific Tropical Gyre, the largest ecosystem on our planet, occupying an area of 20 million square kilometres, has been renamed the garbage patch, due to the awfully high amount of debris and plastic found that equals the area of the State of Texas. In this area there is more plastic than plankton, at a ratio of 6:1. Some plastic in the gyre will not breakdown for the lifetime of the grandchildren of the people who threw it away.

Fishes, turtles and birds sometimes mistake plastic and debris for food and eat it with dramatic consequences often times leading to their death.

The chemicals in the debris are absorbed by the fishes that will end-up on our markets and tables, creating illness in humans such as cancer and infertility to mention two.

What goes around, comes around...we are the cause of this and we are to pay for it...if not us, our children or grandchildren will.
Oil spills are becoming more and more daily news, destroying vast areas of marine life and coastlines. The most recent one in the Gulf of Mexico shows that oil does not need any visa to cross borders and is now hitting the coastline of the United States. 
Financial damage, probably in the billion dollars, actual damage (because money after all is not more important than lives) probably incalculable, it depends how much value you attribute to people's and animals' lives.

Finally, sewage from households, chemicals from factories, waste disposals from cruise ships transporting thousands of customers through the oceans are just adding to the destruction of the beautiful marine environment that we have been given to enjoy.

Pollution is obviously a main contribution to habitat destruction, but not the only one. Another culprit is overfishing.

In order to get more and more profit and satisfy our need for delicious seafood dinners, shark fin soups, sashimi platters, we are fishing at a rate higher than the one fishes reproduce themselves, therefore depleting the oceans. Again we treat valuable finite resources as they were infinite and we are approaching the end.

If you have never heard about it before watch "The End of Line" (refer to the "Want to know more" section of this blog), the trailer below will give you an idea:

A shocking report from Science magazine has unveiled that if we keep hunting the oceans at this rate, by 2048 there will be no fishes in the oceans, this will be the last generation to enjoy wild seafood.
Furthermore, quoting from the site www.overfishing.org: 

"The UN Food and Agriculture Organization published a two yearly report (SOFIA) on the state of the world's fisheries and aquaculture. The report is generally rather conservative regarding the acknowledging of problems but does show the main issues. In general it can be stated that the SOFIA report is a number of years behind time of the real situation and shows that:

• 52% of fish stocks are fully exploited
• 20% are moderately exploited
• 17% are overexploited
• 7% are depleted
• 1% is recovering from depletion

The above shows that over 25% of all the world's fish stocks are either overexploited or depleted. Another 52% is fully exploited, these are in imminent danger of overexploitation (maximum sustainable production level) and collapse. Thus a total of almost 80% of the world's fisheries are fully- to over-exploited, depleted, or in a state of collapse. Worldwide about 90% of the stocks of large predatory fish stocks are already gone. In the real world all this comes down to two serious problems.

We are losing species as well as entire ecosystems. As a result the overall ecological unity of our oceans are under stress and at risk of collapse.

We are in risk of losing a valuable food source many depend upon for social, economical or dietary reasons."
Besides, overfishing has terrible consequences on coral reefs. Aggressive method of fishing based on dragging nets on the ocean floors or in worse cases use of dynamite are completely destroying coral reefs and other form of lives that have key roles in a very delicate ecosystem where every single being existence is tightly related to others.
Unfortunately pollution and overfishing are not the only causes of destruction of the oceans ecosystem. CO2 emissions that are the cause of global warming have also fatal consequences on marine life, mainly for two reasons:

1. As temperature increases, also ocean waters get warmer, destabilizing a very delicate ecosystem. Oceans organisms such as krill and coral reefs are the first affected. Corals will bleach and eventually die-off. Krill reproduce at slower rates in warmer waters therefore affecting the survival of other species relying on a krill diet.
2. Recently scientists have discovered that part of the CO2 emitted in the atmosphere is actually absorbed by oceans. This is good for us as it has slowed down the effects of global warming, but turns out to be quite bad for the oceans. Increasing levels of CO2 heighten the acidity level of the oceans. Coral reefs are very sensitive to this and start bleaching, eventually dying off. Corals are the source of life for million of ocean species and it goes without saying that even a minimum alteration in this very delicate ecosystem can create catastrophic consequences.

I started this post with a video and would like to conclude it with another one. It is from a documentary called "Life After People" and show what would happen if all of a sudden people disappeared from the surface of the planet....the outcome? A big breath of relief...but this is for another post.