Following a contest in the Spring of 2021, online users selected Healthy Seas to win a cash prize from Lefrik, the Spanish sustainable backpack brand. With the donation, we set up the 1st 2 cleanups with Ghost Diving Costa Brava.
Our long time wish to start this collaboration came true this Summer. Since June 29th, the volunteer divers of this amazing group have carried out several ghost net cleanups saving the lives of animals either by releasing them from nets or by making sure there are no nets to trap them in the future!
In 2015, Spain was labelled Europe’s most polluted country by the European Environment Agency (EEA). The three Spanish water areas with the highest presence of plastics are the Alboran Sea, the Gulf of Alicante and the vicinity of Barcelona probably related to fishing and industrial activities and high population densities. The beaches with the highest presence of litter objects were those belonging to the Mediterranean. The results of 2 studies coincide to indicate that the main component is plastic, mainly from fishing activity and maritime traffic. 1
During the first 2 cleanups, the divers removed approximately 100 kgs of ghost nets from the area of Tossa de Mar in Costa Brava. We look forward to many more exciting projects together with them to help make the seas around Spain clean and healthy!
- M.A. Martín-Lara, V. Godoy, L. Quesada, E.J. Lozano, M. Calero,
Environmental status of marine plastic pollution in Spain,
Marine Pollution Bulletin,
Volume 170,
2021,
112677,
ISSN 0025-326X,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2021.112677.
(https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0025326X21007116)
