Marine

China has replenished 30 of rivers via the central route of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project. The project, which began in April 2018 and is expected to take several decades to complete, is a state-run infrastructure programme to move 44.8 billion cubic metres of fresh water each year from the Yangtze River to China’s arid and industrialised northern territories via three ...

International waters – known as the “common heritage of (human)kind” – are said to be under a new and supposedly deadly threat from the deep-sea mining industry. The International Seabed Authority (ISA), a UN agency which has reportedly not received much public scrutiny until now, meets in Kingston, Jamaica this week to discuss how to open up the deep-sea bed ...

A multi-stakeholder partnership of conservationists from across West Africa is joining hands this week to coordinate actions in the fight to save aquatic wildlife, which are facing an increasing level of threats. The alliance, known as the Abidjan Aquatic Wildlife Partnership (AAWP), which was formed following concerns raised on this issue at the Abidjan Convention’s Twelfth Conference of the Parties ...

A new GEF-financed project for coastal resilience will support Liberia’s goals to end poverty and ensure low-carbon, climate-resilient development. The President of Liberia, George Weah, launched a new project in New Kru Town, Liberia, in July 2018 that will help build the resilience of vulnerable communities against climate change while contributing to achieving sustainable development in the country. The new project, ...

The Executive Secretary of the Abidjan Convention has said that the Canary Current Large Marine Ecosystem (CCLME) project has a unique strategic combination of fisheries and ecosystem governance frameworks and will through governance reforms, investments and management programmes, enable the participating countries to address priority transboundary concerns on declining fisheries, associated biodiversity and water quality. Abou Bamba further disclosed that ...

A third of the world’s oceans are overfished and fish consumption is at an all-time high, raising fears over the sustainability of a key source of protein for millions around the world, the UN warned in a report on Monday, July 9, 2018. According to a report released by the Food and Agriculture Organisation, overfishing is particularly bad in parts ...

The Belize Barrier Reef Reserve System – the world’s second largest coral reef system after the Great Barrier Reef – has come off the List of World Heritage in Danger, following the advice of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The decision was taken on Tuesday, June 26, 2018 at UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee meeting taking place in ...

The Abidjan Convention is a comprehensive umbrella agreement, which came into force in 1984, for the protection and management of the marine and coastal areas of the South-Eastern Atlantic Ocean from Mauritania to the western seaboard of South Africa. Pollution from the atmosphere and from ships, dumping, land-based activities, exploration and exploitation of the seabed are among its pressing concerns ...

The Nigerian Institute for Oceanography and Marine Research (NIOMR) on Friday, June 8, 2018 called on Nigerians to do more to ensure safety of marine lives. NIOMR’s Assistant Director, Dr Mabel Yarhere, made the call in Lagos during the “Alfa Beach Clean-up and Up Cycle Training” to mark the 2018 World Oceans Day. The institute organised the event in collaboration ...

An environmental group, Let’s Do It Campaign Nigeria, and the Junior Chamber International (JCI) Lagos Metropolitan, on Saturday cleaned-up the Elegushi beach to mark the World Ocean Day. The Elegushi Beach is a private beach located at Lekki in Lagos State. The beach is owned by the Elegushi Royal family of Lagos. World Oceans Day is observed yearly on June ...