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The MAP News, 280th Ed., 07 January 2012
Dear Friends,
This is the 280th Edition of the Mangrove Action Project News, January 7, 2012.
For the Mangroves,
Alfredo Quarto
Mangrove Action Project
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SHRIMP LESS, THINK MORE campaign has changed it's name to QUESTION YOUR SHRIMP:
Learn more about the affects of the shrimp industry on mangroves by visiting our blog.
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VIEW Murder of Mystics Trailer
A 1min 37 sec. trailer of the film "Killing of the Spiritual Tree" i.e. Mangroves of the Indus Delta from Outfield productions. An Outfield productions' film about the "Killing of the Spiritual Tree" i.e. Mangroves of the Indus Delta VIEW TRAILER
VIEW New Fact Sheet for Phulbari Coal Project CLICK TO VIEW
Support MAP's Efforts
MAP's 2012 Calendar Order Form
Print form and mail in to MAP – Click Here
Support MAP trough Reading
Purchase a copy of Kennedy Warne’s book Let Them Eat Shrimp: The Tragic Disappearance of the Rainforests of the Sea at www.letthemeatshrimp.org. Just add the promo code 5MAP at check-out and you’ll receive a 25% discount off the cost of the book plus 10% of the proceeds will go back to the organization to support their efforts to save mangroves. PLEASE PASS THIS INVITATION ON TO YOUR FRIENDS AND COLLEAGUES MORE INFO
Support MAP through Art!
Enma Saiz has released only 50 signed reproductions.
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Own one of these beautiful photos of Karin Wijnand's specially commissioned mangrove sculptures. CLICK HERE for pricing details, then Click here to receive Email Instructions on how to order.
Support MAP through Kayaking!
Book your Mangrove Kayak adventure and MAP receives a portion of proceeds to contiue its work!
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URGENT - VOLUNTEERS NEEDED!
MAP is looking for volunteer interns for its Thailand Headquarters – READ MORE
MAP’s VOLUNTEER INTERNS HELP MAP MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE
READ MORE
Volunteers and/or Part-time Independent Contractors Needed
to help distribute and sell MAP's Children's Mangrove Art Calendars for 2012. Job starts immediately till the end of January, 2012. A 25% Commission for calendar sales that they bring in. CONTACT MAP
MANGROVE ISSUES
“Education In The Mangroves" can now be seen on the PhotoPhilanthropy website here!
Mangrove Rebirth Now on Air! WATCH NOW
Marvellous Mangroves – A Curriculum-Based Teachers Guide.
By Martin A. Keeley, Education Director, Mangrove Action Project
Read this 10 page history of the development of MAP’s educational curriculum VIEW DOCUMENT
FOR MORE ON MAPs AWARD WINNING CHINA MANGROVE CURRICULUM VISIT THESE SIGHTS
SLIDE SHOW
VIMEO SHOW
Education In The Mangroves
Six minute video features discussion of Mangrove Action Project’s Mangrove Curriculum VIEW THE VIDEO
"Question Your Shrimp" Campaign
Learn more about the affects of the shrimp industry on mangroves by visiting our blog
Editor’s Note: Mangrove Action Project’s Executive Director, Alfrodo Quarto was interviewed about shrimp by Green Acre Radio’s Martha Baskin
FEATURED STORY
Madagascar fishermen protect mangroves to save jobs
Mangroves spread over thousands of hectares of Madagascar's west coast, rich with fish and crabs, but fishermen have declared some areas off limits, seeking to ensure future catches. "The communities chose to close several sites for four months of the year, to allow the crabs and fish to reproduce," said Thomas of Blue Ventures, a British marine conservation group, who like other locals goes by just one name. Three sites totaling 200 hectares(nearly 500 acres) around the town of Belo-sur-merwere chosen to pilot the project in the coastal forests that cover 4,000 square kilometers (1,500 square miles) of Madagascar. These thick mangrove swamps are home to mud crabs, known formally as Scylla serrata, whose catches are the economic mainstay of this region. Since 2004, community groups have closed more than 130 areas to fishing, but this is the first time they have blocked fishing in a mangrove. Antanimanimbo is a hamlet of a few wooden huts built on a finger of sand between the ocean and the mangrove. Its 100 residents live by the rhythm of the tides. "There used to be so many crabs in the mangrove. Now there's just a few. That makes me worry for future generations," said Jean-Francois, the 62-year-old vice president of the village's fishing association. READ MORE
Africa
Shell oil spill hits Nigerian shores, fishing suspended
NIGERIA - Nigerian officials have suspended fishing off the southern coast after about 40,000 barrels (1.7 million gallons) of crude oil was spilled from a Shell production platform in the Bonga oil field. The oil leaked into the Atlantic Ocean on December 20, 2011 during what the company called a "routine operation" to transfer oil to a tanker from Shell's Bonga floating production, storage and off-take vessel. The oily sheen covered an estimated 350-square-mile area off the oil-rich Niger Delta. Shell has shut down the entire Bonga oil field, a site 75 milesoff the coast that produces 200,000 barrels of oil and gas a day. An investigation is underway to determine how 40,000 barrels of oil spilled while being loaded onto the tanker. Shell says a break in a transfer line is to blame. Since the leak, teams from the Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company, SNEPCo, have worked around the clock with international oil spill experts, using a combination of dispersants and booms to control the leaked oil, the company said in a statement. READ MORE
Asia
Environmental priorities: Mangroves face the axe for the sake of a park
INDIA - The Cantonment Board Clifton (CBC) has chipped off mangroves planted along Sea View to make space for a park – even though experts claim the park will not be able to bear high tides and wind. Tractors are rooting out the mangroves planted at the Avicennia marina on a daily basis and they lie in a heap at the corner of the wall that runs from McDonald’s towards the Village restaurant. This will make way for a park which is informally being called the BeachPark. Spread over 5.5 acres, it comprises a few benches and a public lavatory, which is still under construction. “Who cares about trees?” said Tariq Qureshi, a senior adviser for the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). “Someone must question CBC’s wisdom as no breed except for mangroves can survive on the coastal belt.” Thousands of mangroves were planted on four acres of beach in 2005 as part of a Defence Housing Authority (DHA) drive to plant trees on the coast, he said. READ MORE
DA allots P280.8 M to help fishermen tend mangroves
PHILIPPINES - Fisherfolk in 31 coastal mangrove areas nationwide will be mobilized to plant trees. To assist them, 40 state universities and colleges will run training courses on how to plant the trees and raise high value species of fish in community-based aquaculture hatcheries. The funding for all these is P280.8 million this year. Secretary Alcala said the establishment of the mangrove farms “is the DA’s flagship program to provide poor marginal fisherfolk families with income and employment opportunities and make them self-sufficient.” He said the mangrove fishermen will raise fish species such as grouper (lapu-lapu), mudcrabs, and tilapia or St. Peter’s fish will. BFAR Director Asis Perez said each of the 31 coastal areas will be planted with 3,000 mangrove propagules and the participating fisherfolk families will be compensated for their effort. READ MORE
Lokhandwala residents take on builder to save mangroves
INDIA - A group of residents in Lokhandwala have turned eco-warriors and are fighting tooth and nail to save a huge swathe of mangrove land from being lost to "illegal" construction. The locals, all residents of the Nav Karan Co-operative Housing Society, said 10,000 sq m of mangrove land adjacent to Oshiwara creek has already been destroyed due to continual dumping of debris. This, allege the residents, was done to help a builder construct a 21-storey tower on 7,741 sq m of land between the Lokhandwala bridge and the Lokhandwala club. Nav Karan CHS, which has 170 apartments, now faces the risk of flooding during the monsoon due to the destruction of mangroves adjacent to it. The residents have written to the suburban collector, the chief minister, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation ( BMC) and police commissioner Arup Patnaik about the blatant destruction of mangroves. READ MORE
Minister wants all departments to preserve mangroves
INDIA- Sindh minister for environment and alternative energy Shaikh Muhammad Afzal has said that mangroves are very important part of our coastal ecosystem and all departments must adopt a safeguard policy for their preservation. He visited Karachiharbour on Saturday and praised the work done by KPT in this regard, said a statement. The secretary environment Mir Hussain, during the visit, said that the department of environment has taken concrete steps for the conservation of mangroves. It has decided that the projects which are detrimental to these coastal forests must be replaced by alternatives. READ MORE
Forest dept creates new post to protect mangroves
INDIA - The state forest department has created a new post of Chief Conservator of Forests (CCF), Mangroves, for the protection and conservation of nearly 5,800 hectares of mangroves under it. N Vasudevanhas been appointed the CCF. The new post was created in October 2011 when the forest department did away with the post of CCF (Research), based in Chandrapur, in favour of the CCF(Mangroves) position in Mumbai. “The need for such a post arose when the 5,800 hectaresof mangroves were declared as protected forest by the Bombay High Court, which asked the government to hand them over to the forest department. An additional 15,000 hectaresmay be added soon, Vasudevan said. “Mangroves in Maharashtraare in a state of degradation and conservation strategies need to be employed to save them,” he added. READ MORE
Aceh commemorates 7-year anniversary of tsunami with education
INDONESIA- More than a thousand schoolchildren took part in a disaster preparedness drill during the weekend as part of commemorations of the massive tsunami that killed more than 160,000 people in Aceh in Indonesiaseven years ago today. Mawardy Nurdin, the mayor of Banda Aceh, kicked off the awareness campaign, which is called “Schools Ready for Disaster Festival,” at the Tsunami and DisasterMitigationResearchCenterin Meuraxa subdistrict on Saturday. “Everyone who works in the field of disaster mitigation is duty-bound to help strengthen the capacity of schools in disaster-prone areas to respond to disasters,” he said at the event. “Most schools here don’t include disaster risk reduction in their curricula, which means even the teachers are often not prepared to deal with the issue.” READ MORE
Agriculture chief unveils program to increase fish production
PHILIPPINES- The Department of Agriculture is embarking on a multi-million peso project to be funded by the Aquino administration’s economic stimulus fund that would increase fish production in coastal towns through rehabilitation of mangrove forests and give rural families additional income. As the country faces the prospect of dwindling fish catches due to overfishing, the department has launched the Integrated Community-Based Multi-Species Hatchery and Aquasilvi Farming, a program that aims to enhance fisheries and increase the number of self-sufficient fisher families. “The poverty of fisher families is often traced to declining catch whether due to big commercial fishers or the sheer decline in fish population. An integrated and sustainable approach requires the restoration of mangrove areas that disappeared due to unsustainable fishing cages,” the year-end report of Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala said. READ MORE
Europe
Why Warmer Water Leads to Male Offspring — if You're a Fish
SPAIN- To a list that includes extreme weather patterns and disappearing polar bears, you can add another dispiriting effect of climate change: too many males. Three years ago, Francesc Piferrer and other scientists working at Barcelona's Instituteof Marine Sciencesproved that rising water temperatures caused some species of fish to produce a disproportionate ratio of males to females. Now, Piferrer and his team have gone on to discover something of a mechanism behind that imbalance. Most fish species don't have the X and Y chromosomes that differentiate the sexes in humans. In fact, at least 40 species of fish — as well as many reptiles — are more dependent on temperature than genes when it comes to separating the boys from the girls. In these TSD (temperature-dependent sex determination) species, the sex of offspring is fixed by temperatures experienced during embryonic development. In the 2008 study, Piferrer's team showed that in a species like the Atlantic silverside, a water-temperature increase of 4°Ccould result in a population that was 98% male. READ MORE
North America
MAP Surpasses Fundraising Goal
USA- MAP successfully raised over $5000 in the month of December from its fundraising appeal sent out via letter, email and this newsletter. This means that with the matching funds given when the goal was reached, MAP supporters added over $10,000 to MAP’s general fund, ensuring that this newsletter and other projects will continue. Thank you for your support. If you haven’t already done so, you can donate to MAP to continue its work by going to the MAP website. DONATE NOW
Giant shrimp raises big concern as it invades the Gulf
USA– A truly jumbo shrimp is causing big worries about the future of the Gulf of Mexico’s ecosystem. The Asian tiger prawn, a foot-long crustacean with a voracious appetite and a proclivity for disease, has invaded the northern Gulf, threatening prized native species, from crabs and oysters to smaller brown and white shrimp. Though no one is sure what the ecological impact will be, scientists fear a tiger prawn takeover could knock nature’s balance out of whack and turn a healthy, diverse marine habitat into one dominated by a single invasive species. “It has the potential to be real ugly,” said Leslie Hartman, Matagorda Baycosystem leader for the TexasParksand Wildlife Department. “But we just do not know.” READ MORE
Shrimp Aquaculture Dialogue Releases Final Draft of Standards
USA - The Shrimp Aquaculture Dialogue is pleased to announce the release on December 21, 2011of the final draft of global standards for certifying farmed shrimp. When completed, the final standards will help minimize the key environmental and social impacts related to shrimp farming. This version of the standards is being used to create an Audit Manual and will be subject to voluntary field testing on selected farms. The Dialogue’s Global Steering Committee (GSC) used the feedback received during the last public comment period to revise the standards document and produce this final draft of the standards. The GSC is developing its formal responses to public comments which will be available on the WWF website in early 2012. The GSC reached agreement in this version and looks forward to using the results from this short field-testing phase to make any final, minor revisions to the standards so that they can be put into use on shrimp farms around the world. The final standards will be handed over to an independent organization, the Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC), during the first half of 2012. The ASC will ensure farms are certified against the standards through independent third party certification bodies that are accredited by ASI and follow ISO and ISEAL guidelines. READ MORE
Hatcheries cost fish ability to survive in wild
USA - A new study has revealed that the impact of a hatchery environment on steelhead trout is so profound that in just one generation genetic traits are developed that cost fish the natural ability to be able to survive in the wild. The findings, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, have surprised researchers by the pure speed at which hatchery fish seem to evolve. “We’ve known for some time that hatchery-born fish are less successful at survival and reproduction in the wild,” said Michael Blouin, a professor of zoology at OregonStateUniversity. “However, until now, it wasn’t clear why. What this study shows is that intense evolutionary pressures in the hatchery rapidly select for fish that excel there, at the expense of their reproductive success in the wild.” The study was the result of a 19 year analysis of steelhead trout in Oregon’s HoodRiver. READ MORE
South Pacific
Prawns galore, with one catch
AUSTRALIA– Christmas meant a sudden demand for prawns. But with imports down again this year, Australian prawn farmers say they are being stymied by ''green tape''. Floods in Thailand were expected to cut the harvest in the world's largest shrimp exporter by 10-15 per cent this year, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation's Globefish market information arm, pushing international prices up to 40 per cent higher. The impact of the floods was compounded by disease outbreaks in Vietnam, where mass premature death of prawns wiped out nearly 98 per cent of crops in the Mekong Delta, although Indiaand Indonesiaboosted production. Advertisement: Story continues below Nick Moore, manager of the Gold Coast Marine Aquaculture prawn farm and president of the Australian Prawn Farmers Association, said imports were certainly down. READ MORE
THE LAST WORD
What? No Last Word? ~ If you’d like to have the last word on this or any other mangrove related topic, please send us your submission for upcoming newsletters. We’ll choose one per issue to have “the last word”. While we can’t promise to publish everyone’s letter, we do encourage anyone to post comments on our Blog at www. mangroveactionproject.blogspot.com
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