Marine Life & Conservation
Antigua & Barbuda Implements Environmental Standards for Diving & Snorkelling
The Green Fins initiative hopes to reach 10,000 tourists in the next year.
The Reef-World Foundation – the international coordinators of Green Fins – is pleased to announce Antigua and Barbuda has become the first English speaking country in the western hemisphere to implement the Green Fins initiative. The country is the 10th government worldwide to officially adopt Green Fins and the second in the Caribbean.
Green Fins is a UN Environment initiative, internationally coordinated by The Reef-World Foundation, which aims to protect and conserve coral reefs through environmentally-friendly guidelines to promote a sustainable diving and snorkelling tourism industry.
Antigua and Barbuda, which has a population of just 100,000, received 285,000 overnight visitors and 1,000,000 cruise ship tourists in 2018. It is estimated there are over 30 businesses which provide either snorkelling or diving activities to these tourists. Reef-World hopes the initiative will significantly reduce the environmental impact on coral reefs by reaching 10,000 tourists in the next year.
The country now has a national team of 2 senior Green Fins Network leaders, 3 Green Fins assessors and 3 dive schools joining the global network of more than 560 trained and assessed Green Fins member dive and snorkel operators. Following a week of training by Reef-World, a national team comprised of the Ministry of Tourism and the Fisheries Division are now certified to recruit, train and conduct assessments of new Green Fins members in the country. This involves providing training about the ecology and threats to coral reefs, simple and local everyday solutions to these threats and Green Fins’ environmental standards to dive and snorkel operators.
The newly trained Green Fins Assessors will be carrying out robust assessments to evaluate the environmental impact of dive and snorkel operators and providing one-to-one consultation to help the business develop and implement best practice to improve the sustainability of the marine tourism industry. The individual feedback and support provided – which includes practical, low-cost alternatives to common threats to the marine environment such as anchoring, provision of single use plastics such as plastic bottles and lack of awareness to existing rules and regulations – is based on each company’s area of highest negative impact on the reef, as determined by the assessment.
Green Fins provides the only internationally recognised environmental standards for the diving and snorkelling industry and has a robust assessment system to measure compliance. Reducing diving and snorkelling-related damage to sensitive marine ecosystems, including coral reefs, helps to make them more resilient to other local and wider stressors, such as over fishing or run-off from land containing pollutants and plastic debris as well the impacts from climate change, such as rising sea temperatures.
The newly qualified Green Fins assessors, who are now certified to conduct assessments of Green Fins dive centres in Antigua and Barbuda, are Trevor Joseph – Fisheries Division, Sophia Steele – Environmental Awareness Group / Fauna and Flora International and Akeem Daley – Ministry of Tourism. The dive operators who have already been trained and certified by the Green Fins initiative are: Antigua Reef Riders, Dive Carib and Jolly Dive. There has also been significant interest from other operators who have signed the Membership form and are looking forward to their training and assessment.
The implementation of Green Fins in Antigua and Barbuda was made possible through a partnership with the ethical cosmetic company Caudalie, facilitated by the 1% for the Planet movement. In addition to Caudalie helping the environment by dedicating 1% of its global sales to funding reforestation projects, the company has recently released a new reef-safe sunscreen range. By creating a range of sun care products which do not include the harmful chemicals Oxybenzone and Octinoxate, Caudalie is helping to increase the resilience of coral in areas of high tourism.
JJ Harvey, Director at The Reef-World Foundation, said: “We’re delighted to have received the funding from Caudalie that now allows us to implement Green Fins in Antigua and Barbuda and ensure the sustainability of both the programme and the marine tourism industry. Tourism has been growing steadily for several years and the government has shown a strong desire to pro-actively protect the country’s coral reefs and marine life through the implementation of Green Fins’ best practices and standards. This funding that now makes expansion into Antigua and Barbuda possible will not only significantly improve the diving and snorkelling industry’s conservation impact in the region but is also a huge step in the global expansion of the Green Fins network.”
Hon. Charles Fernandez, Antigua and Barbuda’s Minister for Tourism and Economic Development, said: “This is a tremendous opportunity. I really applaud the initiative. I congratulate the fisheries department for collaborating with us. It is very important for tourism but even more it is important for us as a people.”
Vashti Casimir, Antigua and Barbuda’s Senior Tourism Officer Responsible for Sustainable Tourism, added: “We’re hoping that through this programme we’ll have more diving and snorkelling businesses coming on board to ensure the practices across that industry remain environmentally friendly.”
Tricia Lovell, Deputy Chief Fisheries Officer at the Fisheries Division, said: “We recognise our coral reefs are under a myriad of threats; not just from use but also from larger issues like climate change and so we figured it would be best to look at ways of improving the way we use the system. This week is just the start and a lot can come out of it and benefit the marine environment.”
The funding to implement Green Fins in Antigua and Barbuda has been provided by the French cosmetic company Caudalie. The company has recently partnered with Reef-World through the 1% for the Planet movement thanks to consultative advice Caudalie received from PUR Project.
For more information, please visit www.reef-world.org or www.greenfins.net.
The Ocean Cleanup, the global non-profit project, has removed a verified all-time total of ten million kilograms (22 million lbs.) of trash from oceans and rivers around the world – approximately the same weight as the Eiffel Tower.
To complete its mission of ridding the oceans of plastic, The Ocean Cleanup uses a dual strategy: cleaning up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (GPGP) to remove the plastic already afloat in the oceans, while stopping the flow of plastic from the world’s most polluting rivers.
Through cleaning operations in the GPGP and in rivers in eight countries, the cumulative total of trash removed has now surpassed ten million kilograms. This milestone demonstrates the acceleration of The Ocean Cleanup’s impact, while underlining the astonishing scale of the plastic pollution problem and the need for continued support and action.
While encouraging for the mission, this milestone is only a staging point: millions more tons of plastic still pollute our oceans and The Ocean Cleanup intends to continue learning, improving and innovating to solve this global catastrophe.
This announcement comes as governments from around the world meet to continue negotiations to develop a new legally binding instrument to end plastic pollution at INC4 in Ottawa, Canada. Representatives of The Ocean Cleanup will be in attendance and the organization will be urging decision-makers to collaborate towards a comprehensive and ambitious global treaty which addresses plastic at all stages of its life cycle and in all marine environments worldwide, including in areas beyond national jurisdiction.
It is encouraging to see that the need for remediation is reflected in the various options for potential treaty provisions. It is essential that the final treaty contains clear targets for the remediation of legacy plastic pollution, and reduction of riverine plastic emissions.
Tackling plastic pollution requires innovative and impactful solutions. The treaty should therefore incentivize the innovation ecosystem by fostering innovations that make maximal use of data, technology and scientific knowledge – such as those designed and deployed by The Ocean Cleanup.
‘After many tough years of trial and error, it’s amazing to see our work is starting to pay off – and I am proud of the team who has brought us to this point.’ said Boyan Slat, Founder and CEO of The Ocean Cleanup. ‘While we still have a long way to go, our recent successes fill us with renewed confidence that the oceans can be cleaned.’
The Ocean Cleanup was founded in 2013 and captured its first plastic in 2019, with the first confirmed catch in the GPGP coming soon after the deployment of Interceptor 001 in Jakarta, Indonesia. After surpassing one million kilograms of trash removed in early 2022, the non-profit project has since progressed to the third iteration of its GPGP cleaning solution, known as System 03, and a network of Interceptors currently covering rivers in eight countries, with more deployments set for 2024.
About The Ocean Cleanup
The Ocean Cleanup is an international non-profit organization that develops and scales technologies to rid the world’s oceans of plastic. They aim to achieve this goal through a dual strategy: stemming the inflow via rivers and cleaning up the legacy plastic that has already accumulated in the ocean. For the latter, The Ocean Cleanup develops large-scale systems to efficiently concentrate the plastic for periodic removal. This plastic is tracked and traced through DNV’s chain of custody model to certify claims of origin when recycling it into new products. To curb the tide via rivers, The Ocean Cleanup has developed Interceptor™ solutions to halt and extract riverine plastic before it reaches the ocean. Founded in 2013 by Boyan Slat, The Ocean Cleanup now employs a broadly multi-disciplined team of approximately 140. The foundation is headquartered in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.
For more information, visit: theoceancleanup.com and follow @theoceancleanup on social media.
Marine Life & Conservation
Steve Backshall to headline Shark Trust’s flagship event: For the Love of Sharks
Join a host of amazing, shark loving, speakers including Steve Backshall and the Shark Trust team for an evening celebrating shark conservation at the Royal Geographical Society in London this November.
Date: 29th November 2024
Time: 6-10pm
Location: Royal Geographical Society, London
Tickets: https://www.sharktrust.org/Event/flos24
The event will be a celebration of all things shark. Those lucky enough to get hold of tickets will hear from engaging guest speakers with a passion for sharks.
The line-up includes (*subject to change if unforeseen circumstances arise)
Steve Backshall: One of television’s busiest presenters, BAFTA award-winning wildlife expert Steve has been passionate about the wild world ever since he was young.
Steve’s impressive TV career has taken him all around the world, investigating a wide array of species and environments. Steve has filmed over 100 hours of children’s wildlife programmes with the BAFTA award winning Deadly 60 franchise and recently, with Sky Nature, for his new series ‘Whale with Steve Backshall’. He has been a patron for the Shark Trust for 10 years.
Simon Rogerson: is a photojournalist specialising in natural history, diving and the sea.
He is editor of SCUBA magazine, the official journal of the British Sub-Aqua Club. Simon started his career as a crime reporter but gravitated towards his ‘less depressing’ interest in underwater exploration, joining the staff of DIVE magazine in 1999. In 2005 he was named ‘Editor of the Year’ in the PPA’s Independent Publishing Awards. Simon also works as a freelance writer, contributing frequently to the Sunday Times and Telegraph, in addition to BBC Wildlife, Esquire, and a host of international diving magazines. He is the author of a book, Dive Red Sea, published by Ultimate Sports. Now based in Berkshire, Simon has been a Patron of the Shark Trust for 20 years.
More speakers to be announced soon. Head to the Shark Trust website to learn more.
The evening will also allow guests the final chance to see the Oceanic 31, shark art exhibition. Some of the artwork will be auctioned/raffled at the event, while the rest will be auctioned online to raise money for the Shark Trust Oceanic Programme.
For the Love of Sharks is an evening with something for everyone who is interested and fascinated by sharks. Join the Shark Trust, their Patrons, Trustees and Staff, along with a host of supporters for this celebration of shark conservation.
For more information or to buy a ticket: https://www.sharktrust.org/Event/flos24
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