Mention coral reefs in Singapore, and the first response you often get is, “there are coral reefs in Singapore?” I could’ve kept it my little secret, but it makes me too excited so I just have to tell the whole world about it – YES! There are coral reefs in Singapore! And you’d be surprised at the kind of diversity you will be able to encounter on the little patches of reefs scattered around our island’s waters.

For the past seven years, the Hantu Blog has been documenting the marine and coastal life that exists around and on Pulau Hantu, an island located just two hours off the southern coast of mainland Singapore. With the skyscrapers and smoke stacks in view, it can be hard to conceive that there is any life beneath these busy waters, but BELIEVE IT! Even the volunteers and I get surprised with new finds after hundreds of dives!

Without water, Singapore would not be what it is today. Our seas are the very reason we’ve become such a successful island nation, and it was the reason why anyone settled here in the first place! Our oceans are full of life despite being the busiest port in the world! If we take care to maintain this balance, nature and development can exist together, enriching the life of millions of Singaporeans that live in super urban environments.

More and more people are become aware of the wilderness that is embedded within Singapore city. The next time you are on the beach, walk slowly and look out for critters scrambling along the sand. Recently, a friend and I were on a beach at Sentosa island, when we noticed something scuttling along the sand. He remarked, “This beach is not even real and it’s so developed. I thought it would be lifeless! And there are ghost crabs here!”

Be it day or night, if you just remain patient and keep your eyes and attitude open, you’re bound to find a little surprise along our shores. Just look at the birds! They’ve come to land on the beach because they know there are lots of critters to eat! So just imagine, what more lies beneath the waters surface!

It doesn’t matter if you’re not a diver. You don’t even have to know how to swim! You’ve interacted with our oceans in some way or another. If you have in your home, something that got to you on the deck of a ship that trudged across the sea, you depend on our oceans. If you enjoy the breeze that cruises through Shenton Way and Marina Bay, it’s the ocean that creates that breeze. If you enjoy seafood (and we know many people in Singapore do!) you need to take care of our oceans – a healthy sea begets healthy sea food for all of us. The oceans gives fishermen and fish growers a job, and it keeps the thousands of employees in our shipyards employed.

Here are three simple but big ways you can help our oceans:

1. Learn about our oceans! The more you know about what is out there and the better you understand our relationship with our oceans, the more ways you’ll learn to protect it. Visit Singapore’s wild places!
2. Not littering! When it rains, litter inland flows into drains, then to rivers, and out into our seas. Every year, thousands of animals die because they get entangled in trash or when they mistake trash for food and get choked trying to eat it.
3. Spread the word! Talk to friends and family about the problems (and the solutions) that impact our oceans.
4. Become a volunteer! Volunteering gives you opportunities to interact with others who care about our oceans. You may also get a chance to meet naturalists and scientists who are working hard to learn ways to defend our oceans.

At the heart of their story is the bizarre fact that there are more fine fish swimming in the tiny tanks than there are in the surrounding sea.

Having overfished and polluted its own waters to the point where they are home mainly to great ghosts of the past, Hong Kong now imports up to 90 percent of its seafood.

The problem with that, scientists say, is that Hong Kong is a microcosm of a marine disaster in which wild fish are being eaten out of existence worldwide.

“It is a sign of what is happening in most of the fisheries in the world,” says Guillermo Moreno, head of global environment group WWF’s marine programme in Hong Kong. “It’s a scary panorama.”

In scenes replayed throughout Hong Kong’s archipelago, the seafood for the restaurants in Yung Shue Wan arrives in the dull light of a hazy dawn, while most of the village is still asleep.

Through the rough streets, wiry men in singlets trundle trolleys laden with sloshing buckets full of struggling fish nearing the end of their lives far from their usual habitat on distant, colourful coral reefs.

They are tipped into crowded tanks outside restaurants lining the harbour to await the pointing finger of a diner which will flag the last leg of their long journey, to the kitchen.

At weekends, the open air restaurant tables under spinning fans host large family gatherings where cheerful children tuck in to food that researchers say could disappear in their lifetimes.

“Unless the current situation improves, stocks of all species currently fished for food are predicted to collapse by 2048,” the WWF reports, quoting a controversial scientific survey.

Restaurateur Ben Chan Kin-Keung acknowledges that Hong Kong’s waters no longer provide what his seafood-loving customers want, but says that is not a problem — at the moment.

“It’s very fast and convenient to import seafood around the globe either by plane or ship,” he says.

But he knows the feast cannot last and says it is already becoming difficult to find fish in the quantities he requires.

“It’s like people just want to eat the fish when they are not (even) born. I’m afraid that I may have to change my job in 10 years time.”

Offshore from the restaurants, a lone trawler dredges the jade sea — but bleak records show it is unlikely to bring up table-worthy fish.

“The average size of fish now caught in these bottom trawls is about 10 grammes” — about one third of an ounce or the weight of a small coin — Professor Yvonne Sadovy of Hong Kong University told AFP.

“To put this into some kind of context, Hong Kong was a famous fishing centre in the past and we had incredibly productive and species-rich ground fisheries.”

WWF says that “Hong Kong waters were incredibly rich just decades ago with manta rays, hammerhead sharks, giant grouper and croakers taller than a man. In less than a lifetime Hong Kong has lost them all.”

Sadovy, a marine scientist who has made a special study of Hong Kong’s seas, says there are several reasons the local fisheries are in such a bad state.

High demand for seafood in the crowded city and a lack of regulation fuelled overfishing which combined with pollution and loss of habitat to push fish populations “well beyond their capacity to regenerate themselves,” she said.

The scale of the pollution can be gauged a short boat ride away from the harbour-side diners enjoying their seafood, where a few pale-pink backs can be seen breaking the surface of the grey-green sea of the Pearl River Delta.

These are Hong Kong’s famed pink dolphins, but the most surprising thing about the beautiful creatures is not their colour — it’s the fact that they are alive at all.

Flush the toilet in any of the high-rise apartments or offices housing Hong Kong’s population of seven million people and it will likely go almost directly into the “Fragrant Harbour” — Hong Kong’s name in Cantonese.

Add to that the chemical effluent oozing down the Pearl River from thousands of frantically busy factories in mainland China and you have a “horrendous cocktail,” says Sadovy.

A keen diver, Sadovy says she has seen fish deformed by the pollutants in Hong Kong’s waters, and points out that many of them — such as the heavy metals — will poison the seas for years to come.

Eco-tourism group Hong Kong Dolphinwatch says that 450,000 cubic metres of raw, semi-processed sewage is dumped into the harbour every day — enough to fill 200 Olympic-size swimming pools.

The water quality is “disgusting,” says guide Janet Walker as the Dolphinwatch boat carries a group of Japanese and Western tourists away from a jagged skyline of tower blocks and into the delta.

There, the traditional curves of sampans threading their way past gigantic cargo ships, high-speed ferries and lumbering barges offer a glimpse of a richer — and cleaner — fishing past.

“I certainly wouldn’t eat anything from this water. There’s not much fish left here but what there is will be seriously contaminated — mercury levels are very high, cadmium, various other heavy metals…,” Walker told AFP.

First-born dolphin offspring tend to have a high mortality rate because they receive about a decade’s-worth of accumulated toxins through their mother’s milk, she said.

The poisons settle in fatty tissues as the mothers grow to sexual maturity and the first-born get the full dose, while later offspring from the same female will have much higher survival rates.

But WWF’s Moreno points out that pollution of the oceans is a worldwide menace: “Catch a bluefin tuna out in the middle of the ocean and it will contain mercury,” he says.

So overfishing must take most of the blame for the pitiful state of Hong Kong’s fisheries — just as it does for the collapse of cod fisheries in Europe and Canada and the threat to popular species globally.

“You see these fabulous big fish, colourful fish, plenty of them, in the seafood restaurants,” said Sadovy.

“But most of those fish, in fact almost all of the fish you see in those tanks come from overseas.”

They come from around the world — the Pacific Ocean, the Indian Ocean, Southeast Asia’s coral reefs.

“In the end we could view Hong Kong as a very good example of the direction we cannot risk taking if we want to be sure to have wild seafood available to us in the future,” Sadovy said.

Having told their tale, the fish in the tanks in the Hong Kong restaurants pose a question for ecologically aware diners: Is it no longer acceptable to eat fish?

Moreno and Sadovy, both passionate about their subject, say they don’t eat shrimp because of the destructive methods used to catch it in the wild and shrimp farming’s devastation of environmentally important mangroves on Southeast Asian shores.

But they do eat fish — provided they are species that are caught or farmed in a sustainable way.

WWF’s websites provide regional guides to dining with a clear conscience that can be downloaded and taken to the restaurant.

The Hong Kong government admitted in response to questions from AFP that its waters have been overfished and are badly polluted by sewage, and says it is working on plans to correct both problems.

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New information on the biology of albacore tuna will assist in stock assessments and providing advice on harvest levels in Australian and international waters. PHOTO: CSIRO/FRDC

Scientists are set to study the earbones and organs of more than 2000 albacore tuna to better understand the growth, age and breeding patterns of this increasingly important species.

Albacore tuna are harvested from tropical to temperate waters, mainly for canning, but also to satisfy the growing market for fresh fish in Europe and the United States.

While previously caught as by-product, albacore have become a prime target of Australia’s Eastern Tuna and Billfish Fishery which operates from Cape York to Tasmania and on the adjacent high seas. Several Pacific island nations and distant water fleets, including Taiwan and Korea, also target albacore.

This rising catch of albacore has generated a need for more information about the species to assess stock levels and provide advice on harvest levels in Australian and international waters.

To meet this need, scientists from the CSIRO Wealth from Oceans Flagship are studying the biology of albacore stocks from eastern Australia and the wider south-western Pacific Ocean to determine their age, growth and reproductive characteristics.

The two-year study – funded by the Fisheries Research and Development Corporation and CSIRO, the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, and the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission – builds on earlier studies in 2007 and 2008–09.

Project leader, Jess Farley, says fishery-wide information about how albacore age, grow and reproduce is needed to provide reliable stock assessments and set appropriate levels for future catches.

The age of the albacore will be estimated by interpreting growth bands formed in their earbones (otoliths) and dorsal spines in a process similar to reading growth rings of trees. Albacore reproductive organs will be examined to determine the location, timing, frequency and magnitude of spawning.

“Previous studies have shown that albacore grow to 1.2 metres in length and at least 30 kilograms in weight, and live up to 14 years,” Ms Farley says.

“More detailed biological information will allow us to calculate growth rates, age at maturity and longevity, and to see whether these differ by gender and region.

“We aim to develop a ‘maturity schedule’ for female albacore across the south Pacific to help estimate their spawning output at different sizes and ages. This is the key to understanding the productivity of the stocks.”

CSIRO scientist Dr Campbell Davies says that, like other fish species, tunas release many thousands, if not millions, of eggs in a spawning season and individual spawning output increases with the size and age of the female fish.

“This needs to be quantified so that stock-assessment scientists can estimate how different levels of fishing will affect the spawning capacity of the whole population,” he says.

The CSIRO scientists will collaborate with the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) on the ageing and reproductive work, which will link with an SPC tagging program examining albacore movements in the Western and Central Pacific Ocean. The fishing industry will provide albacore samples and an archival reference collection will be established.

Indonesia’s marine tourism revenue reached US$2 billion per year and the country earned around US$2.2 billion from fish exports in 2008, Indonesia’s Antara news agency quoted Alfred Nakatsuma, director of the Environment office of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), as saying recently.

Oceans are the source of most rainfall, regulate the earth’s temperatures and wind patterns, clean the water the people drink, offer a pharmacopoeia of potential medicines, and generate most of the oxygen the people breathe.

Healthy and functioning oceans provide essential services to human communities that support economic well-being and human health to inlude providing food, shoreline protection, a source of non living resources for energy and trade, recreation and culture.

The world’s ocean and climate are inextricably linked: the ocean plays a crucial role in maintaining the Earth’s climate, and ocean life is vulnerable to climate change, which could among other things trigger sea-level rise.

“Likewise, in our interconnected world, the ocean affects us and we affect the ocean,” according to the Ocean Project in its press release observing the first World Ocean Day themed “one ocean, one climate, one future”, on June 8, 2009.

The world’s oceans and seas are now understood to be the biggest sink of greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels.

Indeed experts now estimate that up to 40 per cent of the C02 entering the atmosphere is being cycled through the marine environment playing a crucial role in moderating climate change.

The oceans play a vast role in countering climate change – they are our ‘blue’ forests, according to Achim Steiner, executive director of United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), in his message prior to the implementation of the First World Ocean Conference held in Manado, North Sulawesi, Indonesia, May 11-15, 2009.

However, the situation regarding oceans and coastal areas as well as marine biodiversity is worse than people thought.

Oceans which were very important, were very distressed among other things because of overfishing, over exploitation, pollution, and global warming as well as climate change.

“We have to improve the health of our oceans,” Steiner said.

“They have to be as fit and resilient as possible, so that they can cope with the climate change burden– so they can continue to provide us with food and the myriad of other economically-important services,” he stated.

This means governments have to urgently address the multiple challenges weakening oceans and seas, from land based pollution and discharges from ships up to over exploitation of the globe’s vital fisheries, fueled in large part by perverse and wasteful subsidies totaling up to $35 billion a year, he said.

Currently somewhere around 12 per cent of the land is held in protected areas, but less one per cent of the marine environment enjoys such status so this needs to change as soon as possible, the UNEP chief urged.

He also called for investments in adaptation, rehabilitation, rejuvenation and resilience of coastal ecosystems, from mangroves to coral reefs and wetlands, to generate significant returns in respect to climate-proofing economies.

These include protecting vulnerable communities against storms surges and sea level rise while also helping to soak up greenhouse gas emissions; filter pollution and improve the health of fisheries.

And perhaps, just over the horizon, there is an even bigger prize’a way to make the oceans part of the carbon market options. Rewarding countries that sustainable manage them to boost their climate combating role and productivity would seem well worth exploring,” he said.

Indonesia, as one of the world’s largest maritime countries with about 5.8 million square kilometers of marine territory, last May 11-15, 2009, organized the first World Ocean Conference (WOC), in Manado, North Sulawesi, bringing together experts and officials from over 70 countries.

The developing countries are hit worst by the impact of climate change because they depend more on natural resources, according to Nakatsuma, when speaking to journalists participating in the Organisation of Asia-Pacific News Agencies (OANA) Workshop on “The Role of the Media in Preserving the Global Environment”, which was organized on the sidelines of the WOC.

The developed countries, however, depended more on industries and information services than on natural resources, he said.

Coastal communities, mainly in small island states, are deemed the most vulnerable to the impact of climate change, mainly due to rising sea levels. Indonesia has around 17,000 islands, and only five of them are big islands, while some of its small islands have already vanished or may disappear due to the human-induced sea level rise.

The WOC issued a Manado Declaration (MOD) which required countries to promote sustainable ocean management and ocean conservation. It also pushed ocean issues as an agenda at the United Nations climate talks in Copenhagen in December 2009.

The MOD also will strive to reduce pollution of ocean, coastal and land areas and to promote sustainable management of fisheries, as well as stress the need to promote affordable, environmentally sound, and renewable ocean technologies and know-how, particularly in developing countries.

As part of the WOC, a summit of Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI) member countries — Indonesia, Malaysia, The Philippines, Papua New Guinea (PNG), Solomon Island, and Timor Leste – was held and attended also by observer countries such as the US and Australia.

The countries agreed to launch a programme on the Coral Triangle Initiative on Coral Reefs, Fisheries and Food Securities and Adaptation to Climate Change (CTI-CFFC).

Among the CTI countries expressing their commitment for the programme, were Indonesia with financial contribution amounting to US$5 million, PNG US$2 million, the Philippines US$5 million, and Malaysia US$1 million, the ministry said.

In addition to the above-mentioned commitments, there were also the USA with committed funds amounting to US$41.6 million (US$1.6 million, Global Environment Facilities (GEF) amounting US$63 million, and Australia amounting Aus$2 million.

Indonesian delegates attended the Bonn climate conference in Germany hosted by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) this week with a clear agenda of ensuring ocean issues are incorporated into climate talks to help save millions of coastal people from the brunt of global warming, in the upcoming Copenhagen climate conference.”

The world’s attentions and commitments to heal the oceans reflect the importance of the world’s oceans to Planet Earth’s health.

As a further step of Indonesia’s care for the oceans, an Indonesian delegation promoted the incorporation of ocean issues in an international meeting on climate change held in Bonn, Germany, June 1-12, 2009, which was undertaken by the United Nations Framework of Climate Change (UNFCCC) in preparing COP-15 UNFCCC in Copenhagen, December 2009.

Source

Sharks are vulnerable because they can take decades to mature and they produce few young. The scalloped hammerhead shark, which has declined by 99% over the past 30 years in some parts of the world, is particularly vulnerable and has been given globally endangered status on the red list, which means it is nearing extinction. In the Gulf of Mexico, the oceanic whitetip shark has declined by a similar amount.

Scientists estimate that shark populations in the northwest Atlantic Ocean have declined by an average of 50% since the early 1970s.

Announcing the red list of open-ocean or “pelagic” sharks and rays today, scientists called on governments to set limits for catching the animals on the high seas and to enforce strict bans on “finning” – the practice of catching sharks, cutting off their fins and throwing the bodies back in the water.

“Despite mounting threats, sharks remain virtually unprotected on the high seas,” said Sonja Fordham, deputy chair of the shark specialist group at the IUCN and policy director for the Shark Alliance. “The vulnerability and lengthy migrations of most open-ocean sharks call for coordinated, international conservation plans. Our report documents serious overfishing of these species in national and international waters, and demonstrates a clear need for immediate action on a global scale.”

Pelagic sharks are usually caught on the high seas in tuna or swordfish fisheries. In 2007, 21 shark-fishing nations reported catching more than 10,000 tons of shark. The top five – Indonesia, India, Taiwan, Spain and Mexico – accounted for 42%.

At one time, sharks were considered worthless bycatch, but they are increasingly being fished on purpose to serve emerging markets for their meat and fins, which are used in soups and can fetch more than £100 per kilogram. In places such as China, shark-fin soup could once only be afforded by the elite, but the growing numbers of middle-class people in the country has driven up demand.

To satisfy the growing market, some fishermen have taken to finning sharks. There are bans on this practice in operation around the world, but Fordham said the coverage is patchy and, in any case, enforcing the bans is difficult due to a lack of policing on the high seas.

“The overarching problem for sharks is that, for a variety of reasons, they’ve been considered low priority and they’re traditionally low value compared with something like the tuna,” said Fordham. “Also public image feeds into that – I don’t know if there are people clamoring for their conservation.”

Most species of pelagic shark take many years to mature and have relatively few young when they do reproduce. The IUCN’s report highlights a study by scientists in Canada which showed that the population of porbeagle sharks, classified as vulnerable in the red list, has been so affected by fishing that it will take at least 100 years to recover. Yet the government still allows the animal to be fished in its waters.

The global dusky shark popualtion, also classed as vulnerable by the IUCN, could take up to 400 years to recover because the animals are not sexually mature until around 20 years of age and usually raise only one offspring at a time.

Fordham said that because many of the sharks on the red list are at the top of the food chain, their extinction could also cause major local ecological problems. “We know that most of these species are top predators and we know that removing the top predators usually has negative consequences to the system as a whole.”

In 2007, Julia Baum, of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in California, who is also a member of IUCN shark specialist group, published a study showing how a major decline in the numbers of predatory sharks in the north Atlantic after 2000 had allowed populations of cownose rays, which are their prey, to explode. The rays in turn decimated the populations of bay scallop off North Carolina. “There was a fishery for bay scallops in North Carolina that lasted over a century uninterrupted and it was closed down in 2004 because of cownose rays,” she said last year.

Conserving threatened shark species might not be difficult. Last year, Peter Klimley, of the University of California, Davis, found that scalloped hammerhead sharks migrate along fixed “superhighways” in the oceans, speeding between a series of “stepping stone” sites near coastal islands ranging from Mexico to Ecuador. Focusing marine reserves around these hotspots might be a cost-effective way to conserve the species.

The IUCN sharks red list is published a few days before Spain is due to host an international meeting of the managers of tuna fisheries, where many of the sharks are caught. Scientists are also meeting in Denmark this week to produce advice for authorities on how to manage populations of Atlantic porbeagle sharks.

“The completion of this global assessment of pelagic sharks and rays will provide an important baseline for monitoring the status of these keystone species in our oceans,” said Roger McManus, vice-president for marine programs at Conservation International.

Source

Shark market, Lombok, Indonesia - "Trafficking the fins of these shark species is not a harmless offense." John C. Cruden, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department's Environment and Natural Resources Division. PHOTO: DEBBY NG

Mark L. Harrison, a resident of Southport, Fla., and Harrison International LLC, a Florida corporation, today pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Atlanta to violating the Lacey Act, a federal fish and wildlife trafficking law, by dealing in shark fins, the landing of which was not reported as required by law, the Justice Department announced today.

In addition, Mark Harrison pleaded guilty to a second charge related to his attempted export of shark fins of species that are prohibited to harvest under laws of the state of Florida. Harrison also pleaded guilty to a third charge related to trading in shark fins that had been prepared, packed or held under unsanitary conditions.

According to the charges and other information presented in court, Harrison allegedly represented himself to be the nation’s largest shark fin buyer, purchasing “millions” of shark fins since he had been in the business, beginning in 1989. According to the plea agreements, in February 2005, Harrison purchased shark fins in Florida from an individual fisherman and later resold them in interstate commerce. No report of the landing or sale of those fins was filed with any Florida authorities, as required by law. Accurate reporting statistics of shark harvests are crucial for managing and regulating the populations of the various shark species that occur in U.S. waters.

In August 2007, Harrison attempted to export through Atlanta a shipment of shark fins that included at least 211 fins from Caribbean sharp-nosed sharks, two fins from bignose sharks, and two fins from night sharks, all of which are protected by Florida and/or federal laws due to their low population levels.

Finally, the plea agreements reveal that for almost four years Harrison processed shark fins by drying them on open air racks and/or tarpaulins laid on the ground, outdoors, on his property in Southport. The fins were left out at all times until dry and were exposed to bird droppings and insects. Dogs ran freely among the drying racks. Harrison would then sell the dried fins and ship them in interstate commerce through the Northern District of Georgia.

“Trafficking the fins of these shark species is not a harmless offense,” said John C. Cruden, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division. “These species are protected in order to ensure their continued sustainability. The Justice Department, along with our partner agencies, will continue to prosecute those who illegally trade in protected shark or other wildlife species.”

“We will not tolerate the illegal harvest and sale of protected shark species whose populations continue to diminish in our oceans,” said Hal Robbins, Special Agent in Charge for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries Southeast Region. “We are pleased with the apprehension of Mr. Harrison, who is one of the country’s largest commercial shark fin buyers and I applaud the efforts of the prosecutors and Agents involved in this multi-agency federal investigation.”

The Lacey Act, enacted in 1900, is the first national wildlife law, and was passed to assist states in enforcing wildlife laws. It provides additional protection to fish, wildlife and plants that were taken, possessed, transported or sold in violation of state, tribal, foreign or U.S. law.

Since 1993, the NOAA Fisheries Service has managed, via federal fishery management plans, the commercial harvest and sale of sharks in or from federal waters of the Atlantic Ocean, Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean Sea. In 1998, the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization finalized and adopted an “International Plan of Action for the Conservation and Management of Sharks,” recognizing the worldwide pressure being placed on declining shark populations by commercial fishing and the demand for shark fin soup. U.S. management of sharks has included prohibitions against retaining and/or selling particular species, including some in which Harrison was dealing, the populations of which are so reduced that further harvesting cannot be sustained.. There are currently 19 federally protected species of sharks.

David E. Nahmias, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia said, “There is an immense trade in wildlife products. Those who trade in wildlife must comply with federal and state wildlife statutes and regulations. We will support the investigative work of those agencies who identify violations of these laws, and commend the teamwork of the investigators who brought these wildlife violations to our attention.”

“We are proud of the coordinated investigative work of our agents with their colleagues from NOAA, Office of Law Enforcement and the Food and Drug Administration Office of Criminal Investigations,” said James Gale, Special Agent in Charge, Southeast Region, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Office of Law Enforcement. “This case is an excellent example of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service’s commitment to investigate and interdict the commercialization of protected wildlife species.”

Harrison is scheduled to be sentenced on Aug. 19, 2009, at 9:30 a.m., before U.S. Magistrate Judge Russell Vineyard of the Northern District of Georgia. Harrison faces up to one year in federal prison and a fine of up to $100,000. His company faces a fine of $200,000.

This case was investigated by Special Agents of the NOAA Office for Law Enforcement, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Office of Law Enforcement and the Food and Drug Administration Office of Criminal Investigations.

The case was prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Georgia and the Justice Department’s Environmental Crimes Section.

SOURCE U.S. Department of Justice

This coral triangle covers 3.4 million square miles of ocean space stretching from the sea in the Philippines to Malaysia, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Timor Leste and Solomon Islands. It is home to 75% of all known coral species and more than 3,000 species of fish. Without these coral reefs, the World Wildlife Fund for Nature says “the fish will eventually die” and the entire ocean ecosystem that some 120 million people in the region depend on “could collapse”.

Malaysia’s contribution to the fund is the most fitting gift to the world that celebrates the “World Oceans Day” that falls on June 8 each year. The WOD was first proposed by Canada during the Earth Summit in Rio Janeiro in 1992.

The theme for this year’s WOD celebration of “one ocean, one climate, one future” is very apt. It may sound semantic but contrary to geopolitical considerations, there is only one large ocean (not oceans). The concept of one ocean is similar to Najib’s 1Malaysia in terms of policy approach.

While the former treats the ocean as an integrated global common where everyone has a stake; the latter emphasises total commitment to nation building that promises a future for the rakyat regardless of race, colour, creed and ideological inclination.

For much of history, humanity has taken the ocean for granted, polluting the sea and treating its resources as inexhaustible. By pushing the natural limits of the ocean’s carrying capacity for far too long, the ocean has reached a stressful level. Large areas are deficient in oxygen and nutrients as a result of, among other things, overfishing, pollution, habitat degradation and ocean acidification.

Ignoring the importance of the ocean can be a great mistake. Not only does the ocean cover more than 70% of the planet on which we depend for security, medicines, food, resources, trade, jobs, and recreation, it also serves as a vast highway for commerce, logistics and communication.

The ocean also helps to mitigate global warming. Its currents circulate the energy and water that regulate the earth’s climate. The ocean is the world’s biggest carbon sink absorbing carbon dioxide and at the same time it helps with photosynthesis whereby the phytoplankton releases oxygen into the water. Half of the world’s oxygen is produced via phytoplankton photosynthesis.

In short, the ocean plays a critical role for life on the planet. Human activities are choking the sea and destroying the life-support system critical to their very survival. The strangulation of the ocean has crippled its invaluable services (estimated at a few trillion dollars annually). Without the ocean, one scientist laments, “Life as we know it would cease to exist.”

Many Malaysians take the sea for granted. Few realise that the sea is larger than its land mass by 1.4 times and it contributes around 20% of Malaysia’s Gross National Product. We consume fish that comes mainly from the sea (10% of world protein comes from marine fish); Petronas extracts oil and gas from the continental shelf (more than 20% of global supply of oil and gas is in offshore areas). More than 90% of our export (by volume) goes by sea and, the sea bridges the peninsula with Sabah and Sarawak.

More than 60% of Malaysians live within 30 miles of the coast; and, almost all the major tourist centres in Malaysia are by the seaside.

The military keeps reminding us that the sea is our first line of defence. The border is so porous that we need to remain extra vigilant to stop, for example, illegal immigrants, illegal fishing and other forms of intruders.

The Strait of Malacca, our strategic lifeline, is not only polluted (mainly from land sources), it is also getting very congested (mainly foreign vessels that use the strait to bypass the straits of Lombok and Makassar). According to a 2008 study by the Japan Institute of International Transport, the number of vessels passing through the Strait of Malacca in 2020 will exceed 113,000 vessels a year; 93,000 in 2007. The sheer number and density will interfere directly with our legitimate activities in the strait like fishing and recreation.

The cost to keep the strait open and safe will rise to billions of ringgit. The probability of accidents in the shallow parts of the strait is high as traffic density increases. Besides not all vessels that ply the strait use the 150 mile Vessels Traffic Separation Scheme from One Fathom Bank, off Port Klang, to Tg Piai, off Kukup in Johor waters.

The sea poses another security problem. While likelihood of conflicts from overlapping claims in the Spratlys is low, the nation needs to be ready to deal with the unexpected threats from non-traditional sources like the 2005 Tsunami that destroyed Aceh, maritime terrorism and piracy.

Regional mechanisms to deal with maritime threats from non-traditional sources need to be upgraded as a matter of urgency.

Yet despite a strong maritime heritage, its strategic significance and substantial economic value, Malaysia does not have a comprehensive national ocean policy. The need for a single national maritime governance agency for Malaysia is both compelling and pressing. Such an institution can help coordinate more efficiently the diverse activities that affect the sea. It can also help optimise the productivity of ocean resources and services. It can also help reduce the costly intra-agency conflicts (13 government maritime agencies).

Reorganising the administration system of the sea can reinforce Najib’s 1Malaysia programme.

Restructuring the governance mechanisms will not, in my view, result in political fallouts as the sea is politically neutral.

Malaysia should emulate Canada, Australia, Sweden, Norway, the Netherlands, US, Japan and South Korea, to name a few countries, which have special ocean laws and a single national maritime authority. The time is now for Malaysia to discard the label of a reluctant maritime nation. We should instead capitalise on our maritime attributes and heritage for a more assertive ocean governance policy.

Living in a global village, interconnected and held together by the sea, the poor state of health of the ocean must be a common concern. The challenge is how to make the sea more productive to reduce humanity’s vulnerability to climate change.

PHOTO: DEBBY NG

WASHINGTON – A new research by scientists has determined that the Pacific Ocean, occupying a third of the planet’s area, faces threats that will render some coastal areas uninhabitable.

According to a report in ENN (Environmental News Network), pollution such as sewage, runoff from land and toxic waste; habitat destruction; over-fishing; and climate change leading to sea level rise, ocean acidification and warming will all interact to damage the ocean’s ecology and coastal economies.

These are among the findings of ‘Pacific Ocean Synthesis,’ a report by the US-based Center for Ocean Solutions (COS) that reviewed more than 3,400 scientific articles and reports from 50 countries in the Pacific basin.

The study divided the Pacific Ocean into seven regions, revealing threats and potential solutions for each.

Widely applicable solutions include capacity building in ocean management, efforts to adapt to climate change and reduce over fishing, and using information technologies to monitor and share information, according to Noah Idechong, a COS researcher from the Pacific Island of Palau.

“All should be high priority,” he said.

“Synthesizing information gives us a good idea of what is happening (in the Pacific Ocean). I think one of the most important findings is that so much (research) has been done,” he added.

The report also summarizes various gaps in research, such as insufficient information about different pollution effects, the need for standardized biodiversity and water quality monitoring and poor information about the socioeconomic effects of sea surface temperature rises.The capacity to analyze and communicate information, and to make use of monitoring systems to network and share solutions, is one of the gaps that nations should work on,” said Idechong.

According to Meg Caldwell, COS executive director, the report is an important tool for policymakers.

“This (report) represents a vast information resource about what is occurring in the individual countries,” she said.

Hundreds of scientists have already signed a consensus statement, ‘Ecosystems and people of the Pacific Ocean – Threats and opportunities for action’.

It warns that, left unchecked, the threats could have “devastating consequences for coastal economies, food supplies, public health and political stability”.

Source: The Gaea News

SEAI has made a representation to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Congress general-secretary Rahul Gandhi, in this regard. At present, the aquaculture and farming operations of the seafood industry falls under the agriculture ministry, the financial aspect comes under the purview of the finance ministry, the Marine Products Export Development Authority (MPEDA) operates under the commerce ministry, and the processing and other activities are part of the food processing ministry.

“A separate ministry will bring all these functions under one roof and help us improve the business potential,” Hashim said. For instance, he said, exporters had planned to set up an effluent treatment plant and a dedicated electrical sub-station at Aroor, but the proposal could not be taken forward in the past two years because of the complications in getting approvals from various ministries.

Source: FnBnews.com

Coral Reef in Amambas PHOTO: DEBBY NG

Some 60 percent of the coral reefs off the northern coast of the province are categorized as damaged, a study conducted by the East Java Maritime and Fisheries Agency has showed.

Most of the damage is attributed to human activity, such as fishermen using illegal fishing methods, for example poison and fish bombs, and natural causes such as sedimentation.

Office head Kardani said last week that a large part of the damage was detected in the eastern coast of the province, in Gresik, Lamongan and Tuban, where the coasts were characterized as sandy. There are not as many coral reefs in the southern part of East Java because of its steep coasts and extensive cliffs.

The limited number of provincial administration officials assigned to monitor the coral reefs has also exacerbated the extent of the damage.

As part of its conservation drive, the office will continue its cultivation program by grafting coral reefs, as it has already done in Paiton, Probolinggo. However, results so far have been underwhelming due to a lack of adequately trained staff and time-consuming graft cultivation techniques.

“The coral reefs could only grow at only 1 centimeter per year despite us giving it all our attention,” said Erjono, head of coastal and cultivation observation affairs at the provincial fisheries and maritime affairs office.

The cultivation project is also aimed at reproducing coral for export, despite the government imposing a very strict policy toward coral exports.

Besides setting an export quota, the government only allows corals from the third generation to be exported, while the first and second generation corals must be returned to their natural habitat.

“At the time being, we are not focusing on exports but discouraging them because the profits *from exporting* do not cover the cost of fixing the damaged coral reefs,” said Erjono.

According to head of the East Java Coastal Operators Association Daniel Rasyid, to prevent further damage to coral reefs, the provincial administration should immediately issue an ordinance regulating coastal areas, which would later be categorized as fishing zones, coral areas and mangrove areas.

“The spatial ordinance should not only regulate inland areas, but also coastal areas,” said Rasyid.

To save the coral reefs, the government must do more than just chose a public figure like Nadine Candrawinata as a coral reef envoy, Rasyid said. It should also think about preventive measures, including raising fishermen’s sense of ownership of the coral as a valuable maritime resource for the sustainability of the marine ecosystem, he added.

Source: The Jakarta Post

At present, Vietnam – with 301 seafood exporter firms- is second in the world in terms of the number of seafood firms licensed to export to the European Union (EU), Nhan Dan reports.

An EU delegation that visited Vietnam last month had indicated they would consider adding a further 30 Vietnamese seafood producers to the current list of 301 producers that are licensed to export aquatic products to the EU. The additional 30 firms were added to the list just now.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development requested that Nafiqad and the Department of Aquaculture work with the Department of Fisheries Resources Exploitation and Protection to find solutions on how to fulfil EU aquaculture and fishing area standards.

Last month, Luong Le Phuong, deputy minister of Agriculture, advised domestic producers not to repeat the mistakes of neighbours Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia. The EU suspended seafood imports from Malaysia, decided to rigorously check Indonesia’s products and issued several warnings to Thailand.

The Ministry further recommended that seafood production and exporting firms abide by EU regulations in order to avoid possible rejection of their products.

As the biggest importer of Vietnamese seafood, the EU accounts for 25.4 per cent of its total fisheries export turnover. In 2008, 26 of 27 EU countries imported 350,000 tonnes of seafood worth over USD 1 billion from Vietnam last year.

Source: FIS

“Forty-two countries have confirmed their participation. They will send their naval chiefs of staff and some deputy chiefs of staff,” First Admiral Willem Rampangilei, commander of the Indonesian Navy`s Main Base VIII, said in a meeting on preparations for the Sail Bunaken 2009 here on Tuesday.

Sail Bunaken was aimed at building a sense of seamen`s brotherhood and enhancing international relations, he said.

“The event is to give a chance to the world to see the marine beauty of North Sulawesi, to develop the mariners` spirit, and to make North Sulawesi a gateway to East Asia,” he said.

Activities of “Sail Bunaken” will include “Indonesian Fleet Review 2009″ consisting of a sailing pass parade to be participated in by warships, traditional ships, state ships, tall ships, yachts, and open ships.

A yacht rally will also be organized by the marine affairs and fisheries ministry on the occasion.

“Up to May 26, 150 yachts have been registered for the Yacht Rally which will start from Darwin, Australia, to Bitung and Manado,” he said.

The warship parade will be participated in by among other things USS George Washington with around 5,000 crew members on board, and the US warship will be guarded by three frigates with respectively having 500 crew members on board.
The warships will arrive in Bitung starting August 12, 2009, he said.

The Sail Bunaken Festival will bring together around 7,000 to 8,000 sailors from all over the world.

“Ship crew members from all over the world will sail to Manado to visit the Bunaken marine park. Sail Bunaken will be greater than the Bunaken Festival which was held earlier,” North Sulawesi Governor Sinyo Sarundajang said earlier.

The sideline activities will include an international seminar on “Building a Comprehensive Maritime Security” to be organized by the Indonesian Navy, and another seminar on “Possible Benefit of the Effort to Minimize Illegal Fishing in the Region” to be organized by the Indonesian marine and fishery affairs ministry.

Led by MAFDC commandant First Admiral Datuk Tan Eng Seng, the delegation’s tour of Mindanao included a visit to the Mindanao Economic Development Council (MEDCo) for a briefing on Mindanao and BIMP-EAGA as a whole.

During the visit, Tan underscored the importance of security for sustainable development of a country and its neighbouring communities.

MEDCo chairman Virgilio Leyretana told the visitors about the need to secure the sub-region’s rich natural endowment, the Coral Triangle. Dubbed the world’s largest biodiversity site, the Coral Triangle spans Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Solomon Islands and Timor-Leste.

This tuna spawning area covers almost 650 million hectares, and holds the richest population of corals, fish, crustaceans marine plants, sea turtles and other marine species.

The Philippines and the five BIMP-EAGA countries recently signed the Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI) on Coral Reefs, Fisheries and Food Security at the World Ocean Conference in Manado.

Leyretana described the visit as a milestone in the cultural and diplomatic relations of Malaysia and Philippines, which are further strengthened by their participation in BIMP-EAGA.

“Our exchanges should not be limited to business, trade and tourism, but should include academic studies as well,” said Leyretana, stressing that exchanges like the visit by the MAFDC trainees are long overdue.

Prior to their visit here, the MAFDC delegation visited Kuching in Sarawak, Brunei Darussalam and KK. Their next stop is Pontianak, Indonesia.

The MAFDC was established in 1980 to fill the need for an institution of higher military learning, especially national security.

Source: New Straits Times

A diver swims near coral reefs teeming with fishes in Komodo islands, Indonesia, on April 30. About 100 million people risk losing homes and livelihoods unless drastic steps are taken to protect Southeast Asia’s biologically diverse coral reefs, which could be wiped out in coming decades because of climate change, a World Wildlife Fund report said May 13.

MANADO, Indonesia – About 100 million people risk losing their homes and livelihoods unless drastic steps are taken to protect Southeast Asia’s coral reefs, which could be wiped out in coming decades because of climate change, a report says.

The Coral Triangle – which spans Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands and East Timor – accounts for a third of the world’s coral reefs and 35 percent of coral reef fish species.

If carbon emissions are not cut by 25 to 40 percent by the year 2020, higher ocean temperatures could kill off vast marine ecosystems and half the fish in them, according to the World Wildlife Fund, which warned that 100 million people earning a living off the sea could be forced to leave inundated coastlines and find new jobs.

The group, which presented its 220-page study at the World Ocean Conference in mid-May, cited 300 published scientific studies and 20 climate change experts.

“Decisive action must be taken immediately, or a major crisis will develop,” the report said.

“Hundreds of thousands of unique species, entire communities and societies will be in jeopardy,” it said.

Scientists have long warned that higher temperatures will melt polar ice and cause sea levels to rise, wiping out island communities and coastal ecosystems. Increasing carbon dioxide is also making oceans increasingly acidic, eroding sea shells, bleaching coral and killing other marine life.

But many questions remain about oceans – which also can play an important part in absorbing carbon – partly because the technology to study them is relatively new.

“We are looking to promote better understanding of the role of the ocean in the climate system,” said Mary M. Glackin, U.S. deputy undersecretary for oceans and atmosphere. “It’s really a web of life. So you need to be concerned about the very smallest thing up to the very high predators.”

“The acidity that will be impacting some of those species could really have ripple-through effects,” she added.

Fish living in the coral reefs, mangroves and sea grass ecosystems in Southeast Asia generate $3 billion in annual income through commercial fishing, provide coastal protection from high waves and give food security to millions of the world’s poorest families.

In addition to climate change, marine ecosystems are being eroded by pollution, declining water quality, overfishing and destructive fishing techniques.

Indonesia, the world’s largest archipelago, said it isn’t going to stand by and wait for disaster.

It has officially launched a new, protected marine park in the Coral Triangle with a unique and varied ecosystem that is considered to be especially resilient to rising sea temperatures.

The park, an area about the size of the Netherlands, is a major migratory corridor and home to 14 whale species, as well as dolphins, dugongs, manta rays and sea turtles. It also has a high concentration of iridescent coral, fish, crustaceans, mollusks and plants.

“If well-managed, this park has the capability to support sustainable fisheries and to ensure food security” for up to 2 million people in the region, said Minister of Marine Affairs and Fisheries Freddy Numberi.

The five-day oceans conference in Manado was aimed at shaping scientific debate about the role of oceans ahead of a U.N. climate change meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December.

That meeting will discuss a successor to the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.

Source: The Durango Herald

Practical hatchery training, Bali, Indonesia, 2006 Source: Shrimpdoctor.com

Government researchers have developed a hardier type of commercially farmed shrimp that is cheaper and faster to produce by crossbreeding local varieties with broodstock from the United States, officials said.

Indu Vannamei Nusantara I shrimp was developed by the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries’ research office in Situbondo, East Java, by combining vannamei broodstock from the US state of Florida with local varieties.

The first commercial IVN-I shrimp production was under way on Friday in two centers in Situbondo and Karangasem, Bali, to be distributed to domestic farmers.

Shrimp cultivation is one of the country’s most important fishery-related commodity sectors, with $690.3 million worth of exports flowing to the United States in 2007, or roughly 30 percent of total national shrimp exports of $2.3 billion.

IVN-I “is highly resistant to shrimp disease and can be harvested faster for a more affordable price,” Made L. Nurdjana, the ministry’s director general of aquaculture, said on Thursday.

Shrimp farmers will be able to buy one pair of IVN-I broodstock for only Rp 50,000 ($4.85) to Rp 75,000, he said. That is about 16 percent to 18 percent of the cost of US broodstock.

“The more affordable the broodstock is, the less farmers have to pay to buy shrimp fry,” he said. “By using new varieties, for example, farmers will only have to pay Rp 15 per shrimp fry. This can reduce production costs.”

The price of a pair of Florida shrimp broodstock is Rp 300,000 to Rp 400,000, forcing farmers to pay Rp 35 for each fry. During their life cycle, a pair of high quality broodstock are able to produce 700,000 shrimp fry.

The crossbreed, Made said, can be harvested in three and a half months, a half month less than the Florida variety, so savings on feed are significant. The new variety is also better suited to Indonesia’s weather and is considerably more resistant to disease.

Domestic shrimp farms require about 900,000 to 965,000 of vannamei broodstock per year.

To satisfy demand, Indonesia still must import about 320,000 vannamei parents, mostly from the United States, while most of the remaining 643,000 is produced domestically.

Iwan Sutanto, chairman of the Indonesian Shrimp Club, praised the development of the broodstock, which smaller breeders will be able to produce. “This could push smaller breeders to develop new varieties and reduce national dependency on bigger companies,” Iwan said on Thursday.