Cruise Report

Jan.6th

Today, a guest educator, Ms. Anna Oposa talked about environmental issues related to the sea. She is the CEO of Save Philippine Seas. She started with the introduction of specific projects that her organization was working on, and then she also explained how the sea has been destroyed and how to protect it based on her insight. “Mangroves are significant for the sea” said Ms. Anna. She continued by saying that it is important to plant them again correctly, create protected regions, and save them because a lot of them have been cut down and been plated in the wrong way. Furthermore, she mentioned the importance of coral. Although 25 % of fish depend on coral, the amount of coral is decreasing due to blast fishing and climate change. She also touched on the marine plastic pollution, which is a global issue. There is a date that demonstrates that 70 % of the sea of Southeast Asia will have been polluted in 2050. In order to resolve this, her organization recommends that we should do what we can do. For example, we can use eco-bags/reusable bottles, stop disposing of plastic straws, discourage feeding fish, try not to hurt coral, and know more about the sea. She left a strong message: “we should encourage people to take these actions and raise the awareness of global issues to save the world. ” Her lecture was based on the sea, which was a huge part of our voyage, thus we had fun gaining a lot of knowledge. We are looking forward to the rest of her lectures.