West Africa. Sao Tome and
Principe, Campaign 2007-2009
Global Ocean supported the work of young environmental campaigner,
Francisco Goncalves, in Sao Tome and Principe. Francisco’s trips to the region effectively prevented STP
from joining the International Whaling Commission and voting alongside the
super-rich whaling nations, and is thought to be the first successful campaign
of its type in the African region.
Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) is calling on the
Government to introduce and implement a National Marine Litter Strategy to stop
the ever-increasing tide of rubbish washing up across our shores.
You can sign the petition on Downing Street's website here
2009 Report - Environmental
Educational TalksThanks to the support of Global Ocean, SAS has this year
delivered an increased number of educational talks in learning institutions
across the country in 2009. These talks have been given in schools, universities,
high education institutes and environmental establishments such as the Eden
Project. The talks have been delivered to all age groups from primary school
level through to further education establishments.
As you know, the SAS talk focuses on current campaign
areas and local issues relating to the environmental protection of the UK’s
coastlines, seas and associated wildlife and recreational users. The
presentations highlight the problems and promote the sustainable achievable
solutions that SAS current call for in reducing environmental degradation of
our coastline nationwide. The talks outline what SAS is doing nationally
and locally along with effective examples of SAS using science at the heart of
its campaigns. These sessions also provide tangible actions that can be
taken by the audience in tackling marine pollution as well as complementing the
cross curricular syllabus' at the primary and secondary levels.
Global Ocean continues to support Ocean Alliance which works on the frontline of quantifying manmade pollution in our oceans. Their boat, the Odyssey, is the only sailboat worldwide to house a marine mammal cell culture laboratory. In 2010 they will be releasing a 5 year global toxicity study on marine mammals for public distribution. This study is very relevant in a world where some people are still eating marine mammal meat. The report highlights the fact that most if not all marine mammal meat is unsafe for human consumption since it contains ominously high levels of chromium and mercury contamination.
On 5 December the
National Geographic Store on London’s Regent’s Street hosted a plastic arts
workshop to support the innovative Plastiki project. Arts educators Edna
and Kit spent the morning with children and adults making plastic marine life
to give as gifts to friends and family or to use as Christmas
decorations. The Plastiki project is very visionary and steps in to a
world of invention and imagination, creating a boat out of a new material
called thermal plastic and developing ideas around green energy. It is
taking an adventurous step into the new clean green world that we all want to
see and soon the boat will set sail into the man-made plastic ocean between San
Francisco and Hawaii to highlight the devastating impact of plastic on marine life.
The Marine Litter Project began with the idea of
doing a diagnosis about the issue of marine litter on the Brazilian coast, with
respect to implementing a Brazilian Marine Litter Monitoring Program. For this
reason, the project operates on a number of fronts that makes the creation of
the Program possible. The Marine Litter Project’s main goal is to raise awareness about marine
litter in the Southwest Atlantic Ocean, more specifically, along the Brazilian
coastal and marine zones. To reach this goal we think it is very important to
establish an open communication channel, in order to exchange information about
the marine litter issue. The Marine Litter Project's action fronts are focused on bibliographic data, development and
application of studies and methodologies, generation of scientific data and
helping setting up partnerships between research groups. These actions give the
basis to future actions relating to governmental, scientific and civil society.
Projects we fund 
Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) is calling on the
Government to introduce and implement a National Marine Litter Strategy to stop
the ever-increasing tide of rubbish washing up across our shores.
