Marine Life & Conservation Blogs
Sharks: A Lost Message
There are many motivating articles, scientific papers and blogs that prove how amazing and valuable sharks are. So why is this message still not getting across? And why are sharks still not valued and seen as a vital component to sustain our current environment by the general public?
The big question – Why is there is no urgency to save sharks?
I believe it comes down to what affects us personally. If sharks go extinct, why does this matter to non-divers and to ‘Bob’ who lives in Coventry and rarely visits the oceans? Well, apart from the depletion of sharks resulting in the loss of commercially important fish species (yes that includes that lovely fish and chips you had last night), numerous scientific findings have also shown that the loss of sharks would impact the survival of mankind! Dramatic sentence, yes, but to the point and true.
Lets look at the facts:
Sharks, as apex predators, play a very important role in our oceans. By keeping the species below them in the food chain in check and maintaining competition, sharks ensure that species diversity thrives. Sharks take the lead keeping our largest and most important ecosystem (the ocean) healthy. This ecosystem controls the planet’s temperature and weather, provides a third of our world with food, removes half of the atmosphere’s anthropogenic carbon dioxide, and produces more oxygen than all the rainforests combined. Pretty important! But why aren’t we being told this?*
I have been very lucky to work closely with shark experts Fernando Reis and Manuela Domingues from Shark Educational Institute (SEI) this week at Freestyle divers, UAE, to create a tailored shark workshop specific to the local species of Blacktip Reef Sharks. This workshop involves educating divers about sustainable diving practices around these amazing creatures, identifying behavioural habits and using different techniques to record valuable information for future Citizen-Science. But I believe the most important part of the workshop is to get this message across: why sharks matter.
During the preparation for the workshop, most discussions focused on our diving experiences around the world with different species of shark (there are over 500 species by the way 😊), but taking a pause from these stories, we sat down to discuss why most of the world does not respect, admire or understand the importance of sharks as we as divers do. And to answer my question: why is there is no urgency to save sharks?
From his experience Fernando explained that there was a lack of communication in different areas. Firstly, between research sciences and the Environmentalist community, but also the communication to the rest of the world. The technical language sometimes used by scientists can isolate the public, which in turn leads to them closing off to the subject… thus the message is lost. To get people to care and listen, a certain amount of marketing skills are needed, which unfortunately, most scientists do not possess.
We also touched on the subject of trends, even within our line of work. 20 years ago, the job title ‘Ecologist’ was held at high esteem; now it’s ‘Conservationist’. I would class myself as a ‘Conservationist’ so this is not an attack on Conservationists, Ecologists or Environmentalists; they do a fantastic job and work exceptionally hard to protect and preserve. The issue is the title itself: ‘Conservationist’. We are at a point where conservation is too late – we are now in the period of recovery.
So much doom and gloom, but is there a solution? Whilst the current future for sharks is bleak (and evidently ours too), I believe there is also hope. Organisations like Shark Educational Institute (SEI) are using the tactic of education in the form of workshops to share vital information about the importance of sharks. These workshops are tailored and created to link in with their specific audience’s needs and in each specific environment. For example, educating fishermen as to why they should help look after sharks. First you need to listen to them and hear their problems instead of enforcing rules – think like them and then we can help them come up with a solution. They must want to care, not be forced. Also working in schools to educate the next generation has proven to have a huge impact in family dynamic and how they change their consumption choices to be more sustainable.
Governments and media also have an important role to play in the recovery of shark populations, but that is a whole other blog!
Overall people must want to care, and unfortunately to care it must affect them. Us shark lovers know and understand how vital sharks are, but this message needs to go further!
‘In the end we only conserve what we love,
we only love what we understand,
we will understand only what we are taught.’
– Mr. Baba Dioum
*References taken from:
www.seashepherd.org.au/apex-harmony/overview/shark-importance.html
http://eu.oceana.org/en/importance-sharks
Find out more about Kayleigh at www.followthewhitefin.com.
Blogs
The Ocean Cleanup Launches 30 Cities Program to Cut Ocean Plastic Pollution from Rivers by One Third by 2030
The Ocean Cleanup, the international non-profit with the mission to rid the world’s oceans of plastic, has announced, at the UN Ocean Conference (UNOC), its plan to rapidly expand its work to intercept and remove ocean-bound plastic pollution.
The 30 Cities Program will scale the organization’s proven Interceptor™ solutions across 30 key cities in Asia and the Americas, aiming to eliminate up to one third of all plastic flowing from the world’s rivers into the ocean before the end of the decade.
This evolution follows five years of learning through pioneering deployments across 20 of the world’s most polluting rivers and represents a key next step in the organization’s mission and the global fight against ocean plastic pollution.
With the 30 Cities Program, The Ocean Cleanup will transition from single river deployments to citywide solutions, tackling the main plastic emitting waterways within each selected city. This follows a key learning from deployments in Kingston, Jamaica, which showed it is possible to scale faster when projects encompass whole cities, as the same set of partners can be involved with all deployments.
To date, The Ocean Cleanup has already prevented 29 million kilograms of trash from reaching the ocean. The organization currently intercepts an estimated 1–3 percent of global river-borne plastic emissions. With the first 20 river deployments close to being fully operational, it is now poised to reduce the plastic pollution flowing into the ocean from rivers by up to a third.
“When we take on an entire city, instead of individual rivers, we can scale faster, reduce costs, and maximize impact,” said Boyan Slat, Founder and CEO of The Ocean Cleanup. “Our analysis shows that strategically deploying Interceptors across just 30 carefully chosen cities can stop up to a third of river plastic pollution worldwide. This is the next big leap toward our ultimate goal of a 90 percent reduction in global ocean plastic pollution.”
City-by-city: a Faster Path to Scaling
Using the latest scientific modeling and on the ground experience, The Ocean Cleanup identified 30 major plastic polluting coastal cities which include:
• Panama City, Panama – First deployment to go live in the coming months.
• Mumbai, India – Mapping of all waterways completed; preparations for first deployments underway.
Furthermore, the organization is developing plans to expand on its existing work to all polluting rivers in:
• Manila, Philippines; Montego Bay, Jamaica; Jakarta, Indonesia; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Bangkok, Thailand and Los Angeles, U.S.A.
Other cities will be announced once the necessary partnerships and agreements are in place. Planning and fundraising activities are underway for all 30 cities. To realize these ambitious plans, the organization is currently also expanding its engineering and operational capacity.
Data Driven Restoration at Scale
Before Interceptors are deployed, each city project begins with an intensive analysis phase. Aerial drones, AI-powered image analysis, and GPS-tagged “dummy” plastics are used to chart every visible waterway and track how waste moves from streets to sea. These real-time insights guide optimal Interceptor placement and provide a public baseline against which progress can be measured.
Alongside intercepting new plastic, the 30 Cities Program will also remove debris from nearby coasts, mangroves, and coral reefs. This twin-track approach—shutting off the tap while clearing the legacy pollution—enables The Ocean Cleanup to achieve long-term impact, which includes the restoration of fish nursery habitats, boosting coastal tourism, and strengthening of natural storm surge defenses for local communities. Alongside local partners, the organization also advocates for improvements in waste management and awareness raising amongst communities.
Completing the First 20 Rivers
While laying the foundation for the 30 Cities Program, The Ocean Cleanup is also nearing completion of its first 20 river projects. The next landmark achievement—expected as soon as the second half of this year—is in the western Caribbean, where the team aims to resolve the plastic pollution problem in the Gulf of Honduras by intercepting the trash feeding into this body of water.
A Stepping Stone Toward a 90 Percent Reduction
The 30 Cities Program represents the first major scaling step in The Ocean Cleanup’s journey to eliminate 90 percent of floating ocean plastic pollution. In parallel, efforts are continuing to remove plastic from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Whilst extraction operations are currently on hiatus, work to deploy cutting edge technologies to map the “hotspots”, or areas of intense plastic accumulation, in order to make future extractions more efficient and economical, is ongoing.
By combining river interception and coastal cleanup with its offshore cleanup systems targeting legacy pollution that’s already in the ocean, the organization is charting a path to turn off the tap and mop up the mess.
About The Ocean Cleanup
The Ocean Cleanup is a nonprofit organization that develops and scales technologies to rid the oceans of plastic. By conducting extensive research, engineering scalable solutions, and partnering with governments, industry, and like-minded organizations, The Ocean Cleanup is working to stop plastic inflow via rivers and remove legacy plastic already polluting the oceans. As of June 2025, the non-profit has collected over 28 million kilograms (62 million pounds) of trash from aquatic ecosystems around the world. Founded in 2013 by Boyan Slat, The Ocean Cleanup now employs a multi-disciplined team of approximately 200 people. The organization is headquartered in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, with international operations in 10 countries. For more information, visit www.theoceancleanup.com.
It’s time to catch up with 12-year-old Mia DaPonte, New England’s youngest ever female PADI Master Scuba Diver, in her latest blog for Scubaverse!
It’s still a little too cold to get in the water here in New England. I wish I had a drysuit! To get my ocean fix, I asked my mom to take me and my friends to the Biomes Marine Biology Center.
What is Biomes? It’s a rescue center near my house that’s home to all kinds of ocean animals—and they’re all local! It’s truly awesome to experience. There are so many cool creatures there, like skates, sharks, stingrays, horseshoe crabs, tropical fish, lobsters, seahorses, octopuses, and even some reptiles that were given up by their owners.
Darwin the turtle is always fun to watch. He’s huge and has his own home, but he also gets to wander around the place on his own when he feels like it!
They have lots of touch tanks. I got to touch sharks, turtles, and even hold a horseshoe crab! (There’s a little lip on the side of their shell where you can hold them—but don’t do this without permission! Their gills always need to stay in the water.) I also touched stingrays! They felt slimy but rough at the same time.
One of my favorite things to do is see the octopus and watch it play with the toys in its tank. I always check to see if any seahorses are pregnant and look for the babies when they’re born. The babies are kept in their own tank at first to stay safe, and then moved when they’re big enough.
We got lucky this time—there was a baby skate in a mermaid’s purse that was ready to hatch any day! It was in a special tank with a light. When you press the button, the light turns on so you can see the baby skate moving around inside the purse!
As our visit was ending, the owner, Mark, sat down with us and told us how he started Biomes. When he was 14 years old, he began rescuing sea animals. His love for the ocean started when he was young—just like mine! As he got older, he started a traveling business, bringing animals to classrooms and doing shows. Eventually, he turned it into something bigger, and now Biomes is a huge center full of rescued animals.
He told us that most of the fish and animals are rescued from fishing boats or the cold waters of New England—places where tropical fish wouldn’t survive the winter. They try to rescue babies whenever they can, so they have a better chance of adapting. Darwin the turtle actually hatched in Mark’s hand!
My mom gets a pass to Biomes every year because I love going there so much. There are always new animals to see and feedings to watch. One time, I even got to feed the octopus!
If you ever come to Rhode Island, you have to check out Biomes!
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