Biodiversity #29 – Mankind!?! – So what’s to be done?
It’s hard not to write a negative post: modern mankind has been around for about 10 thousand years, and in that space of time we’ve driven many species that have been around for 10’s of millions of years to the brink of extinction, not to mention the species we have completely eradicated.
We’ve released billions of tonnes of plastics and billions of tonnes of other very unnatural stuff, including heavy metals and other toxins, into the ocean.
We caused the oceans to warm and become more acidic causing more extreme weather events and more coral bleaching events.
Using super-trawlers, drift nets and simple rods and lines we’ve decimated many fish populations across vast areas.
However, I believe that recently, some of us have collectively ‘come to our senses’ and realised that we can, and should stand up to our governments if they are not moving fast enough on some of these issues.
Scuba divers can play a significant role in spreading the message that what we do on land impacts what happens in our oceans and that without sustainable practices within fisheries the old adage “There’s plenty more fish in the sea” will simply no longer be true.
Diveplanit’s mission is to help build ocean advocacy and we’ve even built a social-media platform for ocean advocates to connect.
We’d love you to comment here on the blog or on our Facebook page…
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What’s to be done?
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Do you know any ocean advocacy groups that are doing great work in this area?
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Are YOU doing something to promote ocean advocacy yourself?
