World Oceans Day marked in Cape Coast

This year's World Oceans Day has been marked in Cape Coast with an appeal to fishermen to efficiently manage plastics on and offshore to help sustain the marine ecosystem.

At a forum to mark the day, the Project Coordinator for the Sustainable Oceans Project of the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF), Theophilus Boachie-Yiadom, indicated that mankind derived a lot of benefits from the ocean and as such any negative impact on the sea would affect all adversely.

However, he observed that the indiscriminate disposal of plastic waste into the ocean was beginning to have dire consequences on the ocean and marine life.

Mr Boachie-Yiadom noted that plastic pollution mostly started in communities, especially when plastics were not properly disposed of and were washed into the oceans.

He said fishermen were also often guilty of plastic pollution as they also disposed of plastics into the ocean while at sea.

He, therefore, appealed to the ministry to ensure the development of a comprehensive Fisheries Act that encompassed every bit of enforcement that was necessary and every bit of punishment that was required to build a resilient ocean.

Protecting ocean

 World Oceans Day is commemorated on June 8 every year to celebrate the world's shared ocean and mankind's personal connection to the sea, as well as to raise awareness of the crucial role the ocean plays in the lives of all and the important ways people could help protect it.

This year's commemoration was on the theme: "Planet Ocean: Tides are Changing”.

The day was commemorated under the Sustainable Oceans Project being implemented by EJF, Hen Mpoano, Friends of the Nation and the Central and Western Fishmongers Improvement Project.

It was funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Corporation.

The main goal of the three-year project is to ensure a resilient and sustainable ocean economy in Ghana, achieved through inclusive strong and effective capacity planning and management of the coastal ecosystem.

Between 2022 and 2025, the implementing partners would work to reduce decline in fish stocks to improve income of fishing communities and address the effects of climate change on the fisheries sector.

Overwhelmed

A Senior Research Fellow at the Department of Integrated Development Studies of the University of Cape Coast, Dr Owusu Boampong, said the sea was being overwhelmed by the plastic menace, leading to incalculable environmental damage.

He appealed to the Cape Coast Metropolitan Assembly to provide community containers to manage the plastic waste and advised the fishermen to change their attitude towards the management of plastics.

Maame Efua, a fish seller at the shore, decried the unavailability of dustbins at the shores and appealed for dustbins, saying that had contributed to the indiscriminate disposal of waste.

A fisherman, Kwesi Fynn, said fishing was the livelihood of so many people and that the timing of the closed season would unleash hardships on the communities.