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Action to retrieve ghost nets from the Baltic Sea begins

Listen to this article Several dozens of cutters and vessels will take part in the actions organised on the initiative and under the patronage of the WWF, targeting old broken and abandoned fishing nets lying on the bottom in the Polish part of the Baltic Sea. Fishermen will conduct their activities in areas selected by
Published: June 24, 2015 - 20:32
Updated: July 22, 2023 - 11:05
Action to retrieve ghost nets from the Baltic Sea begins
Listen to this article

Several dozens of cutters and vessels will take part in the actions organised on the initiative and under the patronage of the WWF, targeting old broken and abandoned fishing nets lying on the bottom in the Polish part of the Baltic Sea. Fishermen will conduct their activities in areas selected by experts. Why? Well, left-over nets are a huge threat to fish, birds and marine mammals. According to initial estimates, the entire operation will allow up to 350 tonnes of old nets to be fished out!

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“Fishing out nets by cutters is one of the main activities of the project implemented by the Kolobrzeg Fish Producers Group in cooperation with WWF Poland. It is also a continuation of an earlier initiative of our Foundation from 2011 – 2013. Then we managed to develop together with scientists and fishermen methods of removing ghost nets. We also estimated the scale of the problem. As part of our project, we managed to pull out 27 tonnes of nets,” – says Marta Kalinowska of WWF Poland.

Of course, there will also be work for divers. Anyone who has dived on the wrecks, or watched photos or videos from such dives, could easily see that the broken nets are a serious problem and there are quite a lot of them on the sunken vessels. Therefore, in addition to fishermen, divers from the Maritime Academy in Szczecin will take on some of the work, cleaning the two previously selected wrecks.

This will not be the first time that WWF in Poland joins forces with divers who know the waters of the Baltic Sea. Similar activities were conducted in 2011, about which we wrote on our pages. This year’s action is the biggest project of this kind in the world. The nets that will be fished out will be recycled.

“We hope that our project will be a model solution to be applied in other countries and basins as well. Spectrum nets are a global problem that we can eliminate. Therefore, in addition to fishing itself, we want to introduce a system to prevent the loss of ghost nets, which will include a new method of marking nets and an interactive database of hooks available at sieciwidma.wwf.pl” – adds Kalinowska

According to estimates by WWF Poland, up to 800 tonnes of ghost nets may be lying in the Polish exclusive economic zone of the Baltic Sea alone.

The whole action is supported by the Ministry of the Environment, the National Water Management Authority and MEP Jarosław Wałęsa, who declared to organise a special conference devoted to the problem of ghost nets in front of the European Parliament on 14 July.

The action is conducted in the framework of the implementation of the investment “Removal of lost fishing gear from the bottom of the Baltic Sea”. “Removal of lost and lying fishing equipment from the bottom of the Baltic Sea”.

The project has received the honorary patronage of the Chief Conservator of Nature and the President of the National Water Management Authority

Source: wwf.pl Photo: © WWF Blue Patrol/ Wojciech Czuchryta

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About author

Tomasz Andrukajtis
Editor-in-chief of the DIVERS24 portal and magazine. Responsible for obtaining, translating and developing content. He also supervises all publications. Achived his first diving certification – P1 CMAS, in 2000. Has a degree in journalism and social communication. In the diving industry since 2008.
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