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THE WITNESS
Life certainly was fun while it lasted out there in the ocean. I wasn’t an exceptional shark by any means–never on Shark Week or in an epic battle with a zombie–just a normal fish with a cartilaginous skeleton doing my thing, always moving and capitalizing on 64 million years of evolution. That is, until I got scooped up by the tuna industry. Then it was game over for me. Continue reading
ID: The Greenpeace airship A.E. Bates flies flies by the La Jolla peninsula near the headquarters of Chicken of the Sea canned tuna company to call attention to overfishing and bycatch issues.
We’ve seen things go from bad to worse in the conventional canned tuna industry over the last year. In 2011, with the launch of Greenpeace’s campaign to reform Chicken of the Sea, information on the sector’s destructive practices came to the forefront. Images of sharks, rays, and even cetaceans being callously slaughtered on tuna boats peppered the internet and ran rampant across social media. A tuna boat helipilot-turned-whistleblower, his voice distorted and face blacked out to ensure his anonymity, told the world about the horrors that were being committed in the open ocean in the name of cheap canned tuna. Greenpeace’s airship flew along a San Diego freeway, emblazoned with a demand for Chicken of the Sea to “stop ripping up the sea.” Continue reading
If you’ve never had the opportunity to see a leatherback turtle, scientists say you are running out of time. One of the most remarkable creatures on earth, these Volkswagen-sized turtles can dive down to 4000 feet and migrate distances of 7000 miles. They have been around so long that they have seen the dinosaurs come and go, and shifting continents have moved their feeding and breeding areas to opposite ends of the earth. Unfortunately, unless we get our act together, they may be headed for extinction. According to Dr. Thane Wibbels, author of a new report, “if the decline continues, within 20 years it will be difficult if not impossible for the leatherback to avoid extinction.” Continue reading
We all know the conventional tuna industry is terrible. It’s cartoon-bad, video-game-villain-evil, worse than Wario, King Hippo, Dark Link, Sub-Zero, Gannon, Mother Brain, or Bowser. The companies that rip up our oceans for profit terrorize sea life like Clyde, Blinky, Inky, and Pinky terrorize Pac-Man, relentlessly chasing our heroes through tougher and tougher mazes until —–.
Greenpeace’s oceans campaign is experiencing a little déjà vu when it comes to a certain grocery store and their seafood policy.
In the summer of 2009, after a Greenpeace report ranking Trader Joe’s as having one of the worst seafood policies, thousands of customers spoke up with their concerns. The national grocery chain was selling unsustainable seafood items to an unsuspecting public, slurping up profits made from destructive activities like overfishing, bottom trawling, and fishing depleted stocks. Customers and activists across the United States sent the company messages demanding that Trader Joe’s cease their behavior and adopt a sustainable and environmentally-conscious seafood program. Continue reading
As Gangnam fever swept the globe, not even the Rainbow Warrior was able to escape the madness. So while sailing out in the Indian Ocean, working to document and expose unsustainable and illegal fishing practices, the crew decided to create a spoof version of the video.
We’d been sailing off the coast of Mozambique, helping fisheries inspectors monitor the country’s waters for illegal fishing. Having been out at sea for three weeks, it was a while before we found out about “gangnam style”. Eventually though, we heard how wildly popular it was on YouTube, and a Korean volunteer onboard to explained the lyrics to us.
We decided that making our own version would be a great way to reach new people and spread our oceans campaign message. Continue reading
Tens of millions of people head to the polls today and exercising one of the most fundamental democratic rights by casting a vote.
But no matter what the outcome of the election brings, it’s clear we have a lot of work to do to protect the environment. Continue reading
25 October 2012 Illegal Sri Lankan Fishing Boat. A Greenpeace inflatable pulls up along side an illegal Sri Lankan fishing boat, IMUL-A-0352KLT, 24th October 2012, Chagos, Indian Ocean. Greenpeace found two illegal Sri Lankan fishing boats inside the Chagos marine reserve on Wednesday and has called on the UK government to enforce protection of this Indian Ocean reserve from pirate fishing.
The clouds were heavy in the sky and the water rippled under the wind as the Rainbow Warrior entered on Wednesday the Chagos marine reserve, established by the UK government in 2010.
This area is a no-take marine reserve, one of the biggest in the world, so it was with great suspicion that we saw what appeared to be a boat looming on the horizon. We quickly grabbed the binoculars and watched that dark spot slowly come into view. Continue reading
For the past six weeks the crew on the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior have been observing and monitoring the Indian Ocean’s fisheries and its diverse sea life, encountering some of the best and worst of fisheries management.
Since setting sail from Durban in early September, they have performed two weeks of joint surveillance operations with the Mozambican Ministry of Fisheries to inspect foreign fishing vessels that mainly target high-value tuna and endangered sharks. Continue reading
Skipjack tuna and bycatch caught in the net of a purse seiner using fish aggregation devices (FADs)
Walmart’s own brand of tuna might be low cost. But it comes at a high price to our oceans.
That’s because what you’ll find inside a can of Walmart’s ‘Great Value’ tuna has been caught in the some of the most destructive ways imaginable. These destructive fishing practices unnecessarily kill tens of thousands of sharks, sea turtles, rays and other sea creatures every year.
It doesn’t have to be this way — even for a company as big as Walmart. Continue reading