Baiona, Spain –.The environmental organizations, Ecologistas en Acción, Greenpeace, Oceana, Seas At Risk and WWF present in Baiona (Spain) at the Ministerial gathering of 47 countries from the five continents[i] emphasize the ministers’ recognition that “a new scenario for the seas and the oceans” is urgently needed and that the chronic overcapacity of fishing fleets … Read more
Oceana estimates that Spain loses seagrass prairies worth 60 million Euros every year due to trawling, the construction of ports and marinas, and dumping. The conservation organisation and the Banco Santander Foundation made this information public during a press conference to present the results of a joint project to restore seagrass prairies developed in the … Read more
This week, the European Union is closing their public consultation for a reform of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) from 2012. Oceana is asking the European Commission to focus the reform of the Common Fisheries Policy on improving the balance and the health of the oceans. Healthy oceans are not only a prerequisite for fisheries … Read more
Oceana urges the European Commission (EC) and Member States to prioritize creating a broad strategy to address both the exponential loss of marine species and habitats as well as mitigate the effects of climate change such as acidification. The international marine conservation organisation is urging these measures on the occasion of the renewed EU Biodiversity … Read more
Capping a five-year effort, Oceana helped persuade the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council to protect 59,000km2 of valuable deep-sea corals stretching from North Carolina to Florida by banning all bottom trawl activity in the area. Known as America’s largest continuous deep sea coral ecosystem, the area includes hundreds of pinnacles up to 500 feet tall … Read more
Beginning November 2009, bottom trawls and dredges will be prohibited in four deepwater canyons along the US Atlantic coast – a move that will protect the Atlantic tilefish fishery but that will also preserve a rich ecosystem that supports lobster, deep sea corals and sponges living in the canyons. Oceana pushed the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management … Read more
In honor of World Environment Day on June 5th and to implement the European Union’s commitment with the Convention on Biological Diversity, the Spanish government announced the creation of ten new Marine Protected Areas in Spain’s Exclusive Economic Zone. Oceana has played a key role in identifying and proposing protections for marine areas of interest … Read more
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 two years of intensive lobbying by Oceana in Brussels and Madrid, the European Union prohibited destructive fishing practices, including bottom trawling, which destroys important marine habitat, in over 160 million acres around the Azores, Madeira and the Canary Islands. The area protected covers an area larger than France.
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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.
