As we are depending on oceans, BVS team would like to sensibilize you to many marine problems; this planet doesn’t belong to us, we borrow her to our children….! We aren’t extrem ecologists, but the  experience proved us that with our PREDATION on oceans, we go straight the head in the wall…!   

why don’t we stop this suicidal behavor..???

JUST FOR PROFITS….!!!???

All experts approved the fact that in 2045, the sea will be EMPTY….!!!  In 2015, tuna fish will not exist anymore……. a threat for millions & millions of people living & depending on the oceans.

PLEASE THINK ABOUT THAT….!!!

2015 is tomorrow, 2045 is not so far…!!!! 

     

     

-OVERFISHING:

  Many marine ecologists think that the biggest single threat to marine ecosystems today is overfishing. Our appetite for fish is exceeding the oceans’ ecological limits with devastating impacts on marine ecosystems. Scientists are warning that overfishing results in profound changes in our oceans, perhaps changing them forever. Not to mention our dinner plates, which in future may only feature fish and chips as a rare and expensive delicacy.             

 The fish don’t stand a chance

  More often than not, the fishing industry is given access to fish stocks before the impact of their fishing can be assessed, and regulation of the fishing industry is, in any case, woefully inadequate.
The reality of modern fishing is that the industry is dominated by fishing vessels that far out-match nature’s ability to replenish fish. Giant ships using state-of-the-art fish-finding sonar can pinpoint schools of fish quickly and accurately. The ships are fitted out like giant floating factories – containing fish processing and packing plants, huge freezing systems, and powerful engines to drag enormous fishing gear through the ocean. Put simply: the fish don’t stand a chance.             

 Ocean life health check:

 Populations of top predators, a key indicator of ecosystem health, are disappearing at a frightening rate, and 90 percent of the large fish that many of us love to eat, such as tuna, swordfish, marlin, cod, halibut, skate, and flounder – have been fished out since large scale industrial fishing began in the 1950s. The depletion of these top predator species can cause a shift in entire oceans ecosystems where commercially valuable fish are replaced by smaller, plankton-feeding fish. This century may even see bumper crops of jellyfish replacing the fish consumed by humans. These changes endanger the structure and functioning of marine ecosystems, and hence threaten the livelihoods of those dependent on the oceans, both now and in the future.    

  Fisheries collapse  

 The over-exploitation and mismanagement of fisheries has already led to some spectacular fisheries collapses. The cod fishery off Newfoundland, Canada collapsed in 1992, leading to the loss of some 40,000 jobs in the industry. The cod stocks in the North Sea and Baltic Sea are now heading the same way and are close to complete collapse. Instead of trying to find a long-term solution to these problems, the fishing industry’s eyes are turning towards the Pacific – but this is not the answer. Politicians continue to ignore the advice of scientists about how these fisheries should be managed and the need to fish these threatened species in a sustainable way.     

 TUNA: SOS…!!!

   Tuna is one of the world’s favorite fish. It provides a critical part of the diet of millions of people across the globe. It is also the core of the luxury sashimi markets. The five main commercially harvested tuna are: skipjack, yellowfin, bigeye, albacore and bluefin. Tuna are incredible creatures. Highly migratory, they travel thousands of miles over their lifetimes. Despite weighing up to 700 kg, the majestic bluefin can accelerate faster than a Porsche and can swim as fast as 43mph – some species travel from North American to European waters several times each year. Yellowfin have been recorded travelling from the US Pacific coast to Japan, they travel at an average speed of ten miles per hour, but can reach up to 50mph. A bigeye tuna has been recorded diving 250 meters in less than one minute – see if you can do better!         

  Tunas are in trouble…!!! 

But globally tuna populations are in trouble. Many species are endangered or critically endangered. There simply aren’t enough fish to sustain the world’s voracious appetite for tuna. Rampant over-fishing and pirates stealing tuna are pushing the ocean’s “natural torpedoes” to the brink of extinction.           

Bigeye and yellowfin are fully exploited or over exploited in all oceans – they are in serious trouble in the Western and Central Pacific Ocean, where they were relatively healthy just a few years ago. Stocks of the magnificent bluefin, the most iconic and valuable of all tuna species, are on the brink of collapse. In 1999, Greenpeace recorded how Mediterranean bluefin had declined by 80 percent.

And it’s getting worse. Advances in technology mean large ships – floating factories – are now able to take as much tuna in 2 days as whole countries can take in a year. Increasing practices of tuna ranching are also further aggravating the crisis.      

  True cost of tuna      

 The biggest tuna fishery in terms of volume is skipjack – the tuna most likely to end up in cans. While skipjack is not yet overfished, if fishing continues at current rates it won’t be able to sustain itself. What’s more, the methods used to net skipjack all too often catch young yellowfin and bigeye, threatening these species further. Yellowfin, a much more commercially valuable species, makes up 35 percent of the world’s catch. The majestic bluefin only represents 1.5 percent of the landed volume of tuna, but its dollar value is astronomical. In 2001, a single bluefin tuna set an all time record when it sold for US$173,600 in Japan.            

Numerous other marine lifes are hooked and netted in the global tuna fisheries with 100 million sharks, and tens of thousands of turtles killed every year causing devastation to the entire marine ecosystems.            

Pirate fishing is also rampant in high value tuna fisheries literally stealing tuna from the plates of some of the poorest people in the world. But even the legal tuna fisheries are partaking in the robbery. The so called “sweetheart deals” fishing nations and rich multinational corporations negotiate with coastal states for access to fish tuna in their waters are incredibly unfair. Only around 5 percent of the value of the tuna is given to the resource owners, often denying coastal communities much-needed employment and neglecting the responsibilities to fish responsibly.               

We have the solution ….                                              Marine Reserves now!

       

Luckily, we have the solution – a network of marine reserves – national parks at sea; areas closed to all extractive uses, such as fishing and mining. These protected areas need to cover forty percent of the world’s oceans. Marine reserves provide a safe haven for marine life. And if they are properly designed to cover crucial breeding and spawning grounds, they also work for tuna and species that migrate over vast distances.            

Marine reserves can help save tuna, ecosystems, and ultimately the fishing industry. After all, the fishing industry has a pretty miserable future if there’s no fish left to, well, fish…              

If we want tuna tomorrow, we need marine reserves today.   

   

  Greenpeace’s tuna campaign is currently calling for the immediate closure of the Mediterranean bluefin fishery, until stocks recover – and for 40 percent of the Mediterranean to be designated as marine reserves. In the Pacific, urgent measures including halving the amount of tuna taken, a ban on transferring fish at sea, and the creation of marine reserves in key areas of international waters must be taken to save the Pacific tuna fisheries and the tuna populations themselves from collapse.               

Retailers must ensure they only sell legal, sustainable tuna     

              

Supermarket retailers across the world from Norway to New Zealand and USA to Spain are being asked by Greenpeace to answer the hard questions: Where does our tuna come from? Is it sustainable? Is it caught from an area where developing countries are being ripped off? Is it stolen?              

We are asking them to make sure that they know where their tuna originates, from boat to shelf, and commit to only sell tuna which is caught sustainably, by small-scale developing country fleets or under agreements which are fair to the people of the Pacific.               

 Disaster for bluefin tuna at CITES meeting

Governments have completely failed to pull bluefin tuna back from the brink of ‘commercial extinction’: it would have been so easy, listen to the scientists, witness the failure of the exiting management group, and agree to protection under CITES – Convention for the Trade in Endangered Species. Instead they allowed the largest tuna consuming nations undermine a vote that would have seen bluefin listed under Appendix I.               

Last chance for bluefin tuna, too late for real conservation

 So the world is finally waking up to the fact that the Atlantic bluefin tuna is in crisis. That’s nice. But decades of overfishing have pushed this majestic fish to the brink of extinction, which is not the point at which we should start thinking about conservation. The situation is so extreme that an international trade ban is now its only hope of survival.               

    -NO SHARK FINS

 The Reality of Shark Finning       

  Caution!!!!  This page contains photos that may upset some visitors.
           

Shark finning is killing sharks every year at an alarming rate! It is estimated that 100 to 200 million sharks annually are killed for their fins alone. This practice is mainly for supplying shark fins for the so-called delicacy known as shark fin soup. Photos like the one at left are not uncommon. Like the beautiful hammerhead shark in the picture, sharks by the millions are being caught, having their fins cut off, and are then thrown back into the sea.          

Sharks that are caught and their fins cut off are not always dead when their bodies are thrown back into the sea. Without its fins the shark simply sinks to the bottom of the ocean where it dies. Such a horrible death for such a magnificent creature! How aweful it must be for these animals… to think that when their body hits the water again that they will be safe, only to realize that they can no longer swim, and end up dying in an ocean, which was just moments earlier their safe haven, and is now their doom.          

  Shark fins, once they are harvested, are then dried to be sold in markets to individuals and restaurants to be made into shark fin soup and sold to the public (especially tourists) for as much as $350 per bowl! The shark fins don’t even add any flavor to the soup. Chicken or pork are used to flavor, the fins are for texture only. The photo at right shows a small line of sharks getting ready to be finned. Multiply this line by a million and you won’t even come close to the actual sharks that are killed annually.          

           

            

  All of this killing for a bowl of soup! Shark finning is not only a cruel and backwards practice, it is a waste and a travesty on nature and must stop before the great equalizer of the sea is lost forever.
Mankind cannot continue to abuse nature or nature will strike back… and with brutal fury! Shark finning should be made a practice of the past so that children will be able to see and admire sharks in the future… for it would be a sad and tragic day when the only sharks people get to see are the ones in books.
              

Its important to remember also, that mankind will become extinct next if sharks disappear. Without sharks the oceans will team with fish and other ocean animals that live off the plant life in the sea. When this plant matter disappears so will the vital oxygen that the ocean produces… than what happens? Think about it.  

   

Pressure from the public resulted in a international moratorium on whaling, but there are no international regulations to protect sharks.
 Shark supplements are used in Asian countries to cure everything from intimacy dysfunctions to cancer. The facts: sharks get cancer and like many creatures in our oceans are contaminated with high levels of mercury. 

 

 -NO GMO

 Say no to genetic engineering

 Your help is needed NOW!

     

         

 Genetic engineering is threatening rice – the world’s most important food.             

 Transgenic animals

                                         Some chimeras, like the blotched mouse  shown,   are created  through  genetic  modification  techniques like gene targeting.

                                  

                                   GMO ornamental fishes                                               

 Fish for “food”

Genetically modified fish has promoters driving an over-production of “all fish” growth hormone. This resulted in dramatic growth enhancement in several species, including salmonids, carps and tilapias.         

       

What’s wrong with genetic engineering (GE)?

    Genetic engineering enables scientists to create plants, animals and micro-organisms by manipulating genes in a way that does not occurnaturally.  These genetically modified organisms (GMOs) can spread through nature and interbreed with natural organisms, thereby contaminating non ‘GE’ environments and future generations in an unforeseeable and uncontrollable way.      

    

 Their release is ‘genetic pollution’ and is a major threat because GMOs cannot be recalled once released into the environment. Because of commercial interests, the public is being denied theright to know about GE ingredients in the food chain, and therefore losing the right to avoid them despite the presence of labelling laws in certain countries.  Biological diversity must be protected and respected as the global heritage of humankind, and one of our world’s fundamental keys to survival. Governments are attempting to address the threat of GE with international regulations such as the Biosafety Protocol.      

 We believe:

GMOs should not be released into the environment since there is not an adequate scientific understanding of their impact on the environment and human health.        

We advocate immediate interim measures such as labelling of GE ingredients, and the segregation of genetically engineered crops and seeds from conventional ones. We also oppose all patents on plants, animals and humans, as well as patents on their genes. Life is not an industrial commodity. When we force life forms and our world’s food supply to conform to human economic models rather than their natural ones, we do so at our own peril.   Dear prudence….!!!   

 

-SAVE THE WHALES / WHALING

 

Overexploit, cheat, deplete. The cycle of greed behind the global whaling industry drove one whale population after another toward oblivion. It is still not known if some species will ever recover, even after decades of protection. The statistics say it all. The blue whales of the Antarctic are at less than 1 percent of their original abundance, despite 40 years of complete protection. Some populations of whales are recovering but some are not.

Only one population, the East Pacific grey whale, is thought to have recovered to its original abundance, but the closely related West Pacific grey whale population is the most endangered in the world. It hovers on the edge of extinction with just over 100 remaining.

Facts and figures:

Recent DNA evidence shows that the impact of commercial whaling may be even worse than previously thought. Most estimates of historic whale population size have been extrapolated from old whaling figures, but this method is often very inaccurate, according to marine biologist Steve Palumbi of Stanford University’s Hopkins Marine Station in California, USA. In 2003 Palumbi and his colleagues used DNA samples to estimate that humpback whales could have numbered 1.5 million prior to the onset of commercial whaling in the 1800s. That number dwarfs the figure of 100,000 previously accepted by the IWC based on 19th century whaling records. Humpback whales currently number only 20,000.

Japanese delegates to the International Whaling Commission (IWC) constantly refer to a 1990 estimate of the Antarctic minke population of 760,000. But that figure was withdrawn by the IWC in 2000 because recent surveys found far fewer minkes than the older ones. The new estimates are half the old in every area that has been resurveyed. The IWC’s scientists do not understand the reasons for this and so far have not been able to agree a new estimate.

Consumption, contamination, catastrophe:

Whaling is no longer the only threat to whales. The oceans, or rather, human impacts on the oceans, have changed dramatically over the half-century since whales have been protected. Known environmental threats to whales include global warming, pollution, overfishing, ozone depletion, noise such as sonar weaponry, and ship strikes. Industrial fishing threatens the food supply of whales and also puts whales at risk of entanglement in fishing gear.

If you’re thinking of eating whale, you might want to think again – the blubber of dead whales in some areas is so highly contaminated with organochlorines such as PCBs and pesticides that it would be classified as toxic waste!Organochlorines are known to damage development of children and affect reproduction.

Despite these accumulating threats, an increasing number of nations in the International Whaling Commission (IWC) are voting for an immediate resumption of commercial whaling. Some new and enthusiastic members of the IWC include Benin, Gabon, Tuvalu and Nauru. Obviously, these new memberships and voting numbers do not reflect a change in world opinion. These countries have all been recruited to join the IWC and vote under what is termed a “vote consolidation program” by the Fisheries Agency of Japan.
 

Great Expectations:

Expectations for the recovery of whale populations have been based on the assumption that, except for commercial whaling, their place in the oceans is as secure as it was a hundred years ago. Sadly, this assumption is no longer valid. This is why we believe that commercial whaling in all forms must be stopped.

 

-SAVE THE TURTLES

 Sea turtles have a low streamline shell and powerful, oversized front limbs, adaptations that enable them to swim for great distances. They have no teeth but use their jaws to crush and tear food. The smallest sea turtle, the Kemp’s Ridley, weighs about 75 to 100 pounds when mature, while adults of the largest species, the leatherback, can weigh almost 1,300 pounds and may be eight feet in length.

Sea turtles spend most of their day feeding or sleeping under reef ledges or in the open ocean. Some travel hundreds or thousands of miles to feed or nest. Females lay their eggs on sandy beaches and are slow and awkward on land. A female will usually lay several nests during one season and may nest every two to three years.The difficult process of nesting takes up to three hours. A turtle must drag her great weight ashore, dig a nest with her back flippers, deposit about one hundred eggs, and cover and conceal the nest before returning to sea. The eggs incubate in the warm sand and the female never visits her nest again.

 After incubating for about two months, the two-inch long turtles hatch, erupt as a group from their nest in the cool of the night, and scurry down the beach to the sea. Many hatchlings swim offshore to live for several years in floating seaweed drifting along the edges of ocean currents. Eventually the young turtles take up residence in coastal waters. Many years pass before the few hatchlings that survive reach maturity. A sea turtle may live for 40 to 60 years or more. Sea turtles once roamed the oceans by the millions, but over the past few centuries the demand for sea turtle meat, eggs, shell, leather and oil has greatly reduced their numbers. Populations continue to decline as habitat is lost and the trade in sea turtle products continues. Every year, thousands of sea turtles drown in shrimp trawls and other fishing gear and others die from pollutants or from swallowing trash mistaken for food.

	Hawksbill Turtle The endangered hawksbill, a relatively small turtle, has been hunted to the brink of extinction for its beautiful shell. Once fairly common in Florida, these turtles now nest here only rarely. Hawksbills feed on sponges and other invertebrates and tend to nest on small isolated beaches.
	Kemp’s Ridley The rarest and smallest of all the sea turtles, the endangered Kemp’s Ridley feeds in the coastal waters of Florida on blue crabs and other crabs and shrimp. All Kemp’s Ridleys nest on a single stretch of beach on the Gulf Coast of Mexico.
	Loggerhead Turtle The loggerhead turtle is the most common sea turtle in Florida. It is listed as a threatened species under the federal Endangered Species Act. Named for its large head, which can be ten inches wide, it has powerful jaws to crush the heavy-shelled clams, crabs and encrusting animals on which it feeds. In the past few years, 49,000 to 68,000 loggerhead nests have been recorded in Florida annually.
	Green Turtle The green turtle, named for the greenish color of its body fat, is listed as endangered in Florida. Most green turtles nest in the Caribbean but 500 to 2000 nests are recorded in Florida each year. Green turtles have been hunted for centuries for their meat and gelatinous “calipee” that is made into soup. Hunting and egg gathering have reduced their number greatly. Green turtles are the only sea turtles that eat plants. They graze on the vast beds of seagrasses found throughout the tropics. Some populations travel over a thousand miles over open ocean to nest on islands in the mid-Atlantic.
	Leatherback Turtle The endangered leatherback turtle is the largest and most active of the sea turtles. They travel thousands of miles, dive thousands of feet deep, and venture into more colder water than any other kind of sea turtle. Up to eight feet in length, these huge turtles have a rubbery dark shell marked by seven narrow ridges that extend the length of the back. Remarkably, leatherbacks feed on jellyfish and soft-bodied animals that would appear to provide very little nutrition for such huge animals. Ingestion of plastic bags and egg collecting are reasons for mortality and population declines. About 100 to 200 leatherback nests are recorded in Florida each year