The oceans are vast, they admit, but not vast enough to be “immune to human influence.” (“What We Do”). Through campaigns, they advocate for biodiversity, restoration, and protection of habitat to create policies in various countries that catch the world’s seafood. To stop overfishing, they campaign for policies that will establish catch limits and reduce “illegal, unreported, and unregulated” fishing practices as well as reduce fishing subsidies that bring the environment harm (“What We Do”). By doing this, Oceana is protecting a valuable food source and securing jobs for a sustainable future. The main source of pollution in the ocean that Oceana tackles is plastic pollution. They call on governments to regulate single-use plastics, on businesses to find alternatives, and on consumers to use reusable bags (“What We Do”). They believe it is just as important for consumers to make ocean-friendly day-to-day decisions as it is for the government to pass legislation to protect the 71% of the globe that is covered in ocean
Pollutants generally comprise of waste materials in various forms. Pollution takes various forms with impacts evidenced on air, water and soil (Huesemann 271). Technology have contributed to the rise of pollution that is currently leading to environmental harm and human illness. It is currently a global problem with urban areas in both developed and developing countries the most impacted. Irrespective of the fact that urban areas are mostly polluted while compared to the countryside, the impact of pollution is evident in the overall environment. For example, global warming resulting from emission of high quantities of greenhouse gasses signifies the impact of pollution on the overall society. Although some countries contribute less in respect to emission of these dangerous gasses, they are impacted by global warming in depicted by climatic change. Therefore, there is a need to address the problem of pollution at the international level. Environmentalists have remained on the forefront in the drive towards ensuring solving the problem of pollution that seems worse than ever. Irrespective of the fact that the international community has realized the dangers of pollution to the current and future generation and agreed on the need to address the problem with even some measures put in place, there is a need for more action both from the individual and government
This image below represents how we should help clean up the ocean. In this image, it shows a plastic bag behind a fish in a fossil symbolizing how much waste is in the ocean hurting the wild life. If the more we pollute the ocean, then this finding might be more common in the future than we would like it to be. It appeals to basic human needs by reaching out to human to help make our planet a cleaner place for not only marine wildlife but also for all of us living creatures of the Earth. Though this is very powerful and compelling advertising, it is sadly true because of how much pollution is in our ecosystem today. As we continue to live in the world, we all should strive to help save our planet and make it a better place.
To begin with, pollution of the ocean such as oil spills play a major role in corrupting the marine life. Oil spills occur due to numerous reasons. For instance, people may make mistakes while using equipment containing oil and cause an oil spill. A representative epitome would be the 2007 South Korea oil spill. Around 7:30 am on 7 December 2007 in Korea’s local time, Samsung Heavy Industries’ crane barge crashed into Hebei Spirit, a crude carrier anchored by Hong Kong, while being towed. The tragic accident took place near the Daesan port on the coast of Yellow Sea, spilling approximately 260,000 tons of oil in the sea. The situation worsened as the barge freely floated around after the tug cable had snapped. Fortunately enough, no casualties were reported from this incident. However, the region that the spill had affected was one of the major homes used migratory birds, and contained a national maritime park along with 445 sea farms as well. People reluctantly assumed the oil spill would not widely spread because of severely low winter temperatures of Korea. Such unwilling attitude essentially exacerbated the situation. Unexpectedly warm climate alo...
“The health of our nation’s economy is tied to the health of the oceans and Great Lakes. The economic benefits that flow from our coasts are immense”. This quote from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a scientific agency in the United States Department of Commerce that monitors the conditions of the oceans and atmosphere, perfectly explains why the ocean influences the economies all over the world. It affects the way people live their lives and the way we are connected to each other. So the way the ocean is treated affects people all over the world. When thousands of animals are trapped and killed by the 640,000 tons of debris left in the ocean each year, we are destroying valuable resources and negatively impacting supply and demand. The world needs to protect this wonderful gift. The ocean impacts the tourism and recreation, living resources, and marine transportation in an economy.
The history of Marine Pollution goes way back to the early human life but the most of it took place in the 1900’s to this present day. Till the early 1970’s it was acceptable to throw all your trash in the ocean. Many of the things thrown in the water were anything from toxics, chemical weaponry, radioactive waste, plastic to even pesticides. It wasn’t until the late 1960’s when governments worldwide had a conference to talk about controlling the dumping of substances in the ocean yet it wasn’t until 1996 when people took a major step in the regulation of ocean dumping. In the 1970’s 17 million tons of industrial waste had been dumped in the ocean the number reduced the following decade to 8 million tons (Marine Bio). People find it easier to dump their junk in the ocean because it was far more cheaper than disposing it properly.
Pollution in the oceans, though not commonly known to humans, creates serious problems in our environment. Oil spills, plastic, garbage, and sewage combine together to form the major problem known as pollution. Coral reefs begin to disappear as a result of ocean pollution and many other factors. Carbon dioxide levels increase as greenhouses release gases into the air. As pollution continues to grow and become much worse, organizations create new laws to help reduce or end some of the major problems in our seas.
It generates hazardous waste that is ultimately deposited in the oceans’ shores. As most of the plastics deposited are non-biodegradable. The plastic pollution is damaging the marine life as well as the well being of human. In the article “Plastic Pollution” by Kiener, it is stated that the plastic comprises of 10 percent of all ocean debris. It has been estimated that about 100 million tons of plastics are used worldwide everyday, and only 5 percent of the plastic is recycled because most types of plastic cannot be recycled economically. Kiener also notes in his article that approximately 2.4 million pounds an hour of plastic enters in the world’s oceans everyday. Therefore, the most important thing that we can do is, to stop plastic waste from entering the oceans in the first
The ocean is a beautiful place with colorful coral reefs and abundant schools of fish. But humans are harming the ocean. From ghost nets to overfishing, marina life is threatened. The articles Too Many Fishermen and Monster Debris both show how human beings are having a negative impact on the ocean by using strong evidence and descriptive adjectives.
According to Stone (2014), Chief Scientist for Oceans, Conservation International state in his article published in ‘Huffington Post” entitled “The Five Biggest Threats to our Oceans” that the top five biggest threats to the oceans are excessive fishing, pollution along the coastline, devastation of environments, climate change and acidification (Stone, 2014). If humans do not begin to take notice of the affects in which they have on the oceans and environment, it could cause permanent devastation of species and water source affecting the entire ecosystem and essentially sending it into a spiraling downfall of destruction. The
There is a lot of pollution in this world, and it affects the ocean a lot. For example, global
Oceans are the largest water bodies on the planet Earth. Over the last few decades, surplus human activities have severely affected the marine life on the Earth’s oceans. Ocean pollution, also known as marine pollution, is the proliferation of harmful substances in the water and is the primary cause of dead for many species whom live in there. Therefore, ocean pollution has various ways to enters to the ocean such as: sewage, large scale of oil spills and littering.
This research paper will notify the reader what ocean pollution is, what causes it to happen, why it’s such a big problem, how it has harmed the marine life in the past, and what has been done to
Research from the University of California San Diego Scripps Institution of Oceanography said that species in the ocean consume a projected 12,000 to 24,000 tons of plastic every year in the Pacific Ocean (Nall, 2014). Pollution of recyclable materials in the oceans is one of the leading causes of why some marine species are nearing extinction. Many authors of articles and books analyzing this topic tend to agree that pollution of our oceans is a problem. The future of this problem is where their ideas tend to differ. The following four literature reviews attempt to demonstrate and support my belief that pollution is getting worse in the ocean and more marine life ecosystems are being affected, but there are things that we as humans can do to change this. Imagine a world where we didn’t have to constantly worry about the vicious cycle of humans affecting animals and then animals in turn affecting us through consumption.