The Court also formally denied France’s request to consider future exemptions for its fleet from the EU driftnet ban. In Italy, the Calabrian prosecutor formally charged several driftnetters for illegal activities and has since kept them ashore under house arrest.
The Spanish Ministry of Enviroment and Rural and Marine Affairs start cooperating with France to declare a cross-border marine protected area at Creus Cap waters together with the Marine Protected Park existent at French waters. Oceana has studied this marine area and has provided to the Spanish Government this scientific information to ask for this … Read more
After months of pressure from Oceana and other groups, the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council initiated a six-month emergency rule prohibiting longline fishing gear in waters where sea turtles forage, effective as soon as possible. According to recent government data, nearly 1,000 sea turtles were caught by bottom longlines in this fishery in just … Read more
The Spanish government, after consulting with Oceana, committed to advancing new shark legislation that would ban the catch of threatened hammerhead and thresher sharks, put in place catch limits for blue sharks and shortfin mako sharks, and evaluate the viability of landing sharks “whole” with their fins attached. Spain is one of the largest shark … Read more
The National Marine Fisheries Service announced that it will adopt Oceana’s “freeze-the-footprint” approach by closing nearly 46,5 million hectares of the Bering Sea to destructive bottom trawling to protect important seafloor habitats and marine life. The area protected is larger than the state of California.
Conservation efforts for other endangered European shark and ray species have also advanced recently. Still other species are in urgent need of protection. Oceana, the international marine conservation organisation, is welcoming a move made last week by the European Union to advance protection for two species of endangered sharks by proposing them for the Convention … Read more
Almost 50% of these long-living ecosystems have disappeared from European waters. Some coral formations date back more than 8,000 years. The Oceana Ranger research vessel has discovered deep-sea white coral in the Aviles Canyon. The deep-sea coral was identified using an underwater robot, which can work down to 600 meters. The first colonies of white … Read more
After Oceana showed that some fishing ships continued to use illegal fishing gear, the European Court of Justice rejected further requests by the French government for exemptions from the EU ban on driftnetting in the Mediterranean Sea. This ruling spares 25,000 juvenile bluefin tuna caught annually in the driftnets, along with thousands of other types … Read more
Thousands of Oceana supporters contacted the Vermont Country Story, a leading catalog retailer, to convince it to stop selling a skin enhancer containing squalane. The oil is obtained from the livers of deep-sea sharks threatened by extinction. In an ironic note, the product was marketed under the name “Oceana.”
Under pressure from Oceana and other conservation groups, the National Marine Fisheries Service denied an Exempted Fishing Permit (EFP) proposed by the Pacific Fishery Management Council, which would have allowed the use of drift gillnets in the Pacific Leatherback Conservation Area off the coast of California. Since the closure was established in 2001, not one … Read more
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We have already protected nearly 4 million square miles of ocean and innumerable sea life - but there is still more to be done.
Oceana in Europe gratefully acknowledges EU funding support.
