It Will Take 880 Years to Achieve UN Ocean Conservation Goals, at This Rate (Commentary)

He plans to say that ocean conservation has lost momentum toward protecting 30% of the ocean by 2030 and that a lot more needs to be done to address the human dimensions of conservation, including guaranteeing access rights, equity, and justice.

May 5, 2024 by Mongabay 

 

By Angelo Villagomez

• Indigenous conservationist Angelo Villagomez will speak at the Our Ocean conference, one of the largest and highest profile conferences of its kind, this week in Athens, Greece.
• He plans to say that ocean conservation has lost momentum toward protecting 30% of the ocean by 2030 and that a lot more needs to be done to address the human dimensions of conservation, including guaranteeing access rights, equity, and justice.
• “At this rate, raising the area of global ocean protection from 8% to 30% will take an additional 880 years,” he argues in a new op-ed.
• This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.

The ninth Our Ocean conference takes place this week in Athens, Greece. It is the largest and highest profile conference of its kind, and attracts presidents and celebrities, who all try to outdo one another with bigger and stronger conservation commitments.

This year I was invited to attend and will be speaking about my 20 years of experience working as an Indigenous Chamorro scientist to protect the ocean. I plan to call attention to the fact that ocean conservation has lost momentum toward protecting 30% of the ocean by 2030 — and that a lot more needs to be done to address the human dimensions of conservation, including guaranteeing access rights, equity, and justice.

According to the World Database of Protected Areas, at the start of the global COVID-19 pandemic in February 2020, 7.91% of the ocean was protected. That number stands at 8.01% today — an increase of only 0.1% over the last four years.

At this rate, raising the area of global ocean protection from 8% to 30% will take an additional 880 years. Put another way, achieving these goals by 2030 would require that marine-protected areas be designated at a rate nearly 150 times faster than what’s happening now.

To put this in perspective, the Biden Administration is working feverishly to designate the proposed Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary. Through the America the Beautiful for All Coalition and the National Ocean Protection Coalition, nearly the entire weight of the American conservation movement is throwing support behind this singular designation. To achieve 30×30 on the ocean globally will require designating 2.2 Chumash-sized protected areas every day between now and the last day of 2030.

Ocean conservation growth wasn’t always so stagnant. A common refrain at the start of the last decade was that “less than 1% of the ocean is protected,” but many millions of square kilometers of ocean were protected in the following years. At the 2016 Our Ocean event, leaders announced the designation or expansion of some of the largest and most iconic marine-protected areas in the world — including the Northwest Hawaiian Islands, Ross Sea, Northeast Canyons and Seamounts, Saint Helena, and the Galapagos. At the end of the year, the United Nations put out a statement announcing that 5% of the ocean was protected.

We were so optimistic about the future of ocean conservation in 2016 that not only did we assume we were on pace to achieve the UN’s goal of protecting 10% of the ocean by 2020 — we set an even more ambitious goal of protecting 30% of the ocean by 2030, a movement sometimes referred to as 30×30. I helped write and negotiate the original 30×30 agreement in 2016, which became the source material for the UN Convention on Biological Diversity agreement approved in 2022.

Of course, numbers don’t tell the whole story, and getting to 30% is only one part of the story here. In the last four years, some protected areas were rolled back even while new ones were created, and some governments started defining “protected” with a higher standard — and thus reporting less of their waters to the database.

But hyper-focusing on size masks many other aspects of successful ocean management. There are also questions of where these protected areas are located, who carries the conservation burden when fishing is restricted, and who reaps the benefits when tourism, conservation, research, and education dollars start flowing.

See related: First ever U.S. Indigenous Marine Stewardship Area declared in California

While progress has seemingly been slow, our movement has gotten better in addressing the human dimensions of ocean conservation — what I like to call the who, how, and what. Many governments, organizations, and individuals now try to ensure their approach to ocean protection is ethical, equitable, and just. For example, the Biden Administration has written ocean justice into government policy with the release of the Ocean Justice Strategy and the Ocean Climate Action Plan, and some conservation organizations have increased their hiring of people of color.

So, all is not lost. The Biden Administration has proposed designating up to six new national marine sanctuaries, several of which involve Indigenous peoples. The administration also has the potential to deliver final management plans for marine monuments originally designated during the Bush and Obama years.

Globally, two thirds of the world’s ocean are high seas, so the recent landmark High Seas Treaty provides an opportunity to designate huge swaths of ocean beyond national jurisdiction as protected areas. But the treaty must first be ratified, and states will have to demand that regional fisheries management organizations and the International Seabed Authority come to the table, as it is not mandated in the agreement.

According to the organizers, the Our Ocean conference has mobilized more than 2,160 commitments worth approximately $130 billion since 2014. This year needs to be even bigger if we’re going to break out of this ocean conservation rut.

The attendees of Our Ocean are the right people — not just the right people to make commitments, but the right people to ensure that money and capacity are reaching on-the-water efforts in a way that is both effective at conserving ocean life and also equitable and just for communities.

Angelo Villagomez is an Indigenous Chamorro ocean advocate and a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress. He is also the vice chair of the Marine and Coastal Area-based Management Federal Advisory Committee and the oceans co-lead for the America the Beautiful for All Coalition.

Related audio from Mongabay’s podcast: A discussion with environmental journalist Cynthia Barnett about her book, “The Sound of the Sea: Seashells and the Fate of the Oceans,” listen here:

Will Israel’s Genocide In Gaza Cost Joe Biden The White House? – OpEd

 

Students protesting in favor of Palestine in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Photo Credit: John Doe, Wikipedia Commons

 May 6, 2024  

By Finian Cunningham

Student protests across the United States point to growing disgust among young Americans toward the Biden administration’s “ironclad” support for Israel amid the worst genocide in modern times.

Daniel Lazare is a historian of the U.S. Constitution and politics. He discusses the impact that the relentless violence in the Middle East is having on US politics and the forthcoming presidential election in November. In particular, how the complicity of the U.S. under Biden in the genocide perpetrated by Israel is alienating large numbers of youth as well as many other American voters.

The incumbent Democrat president is counting on the votes of younger citizens as he faces off with Republican contender Donald Trump in a tight election only 4 months away.

Lazare draws a parallel with the 1968 presidential election when an incumbent Democrat White House was lost because of widespread protests against the Vietnam War.

Biden is heading toward a similar fate as protests in universities and colleges spread against the genocide in Gaza that his administration is enabling with weapons supplies and political support to the Israeli regime.

Lazare believes we are witnessing a historic moment of change in the United States where the horror of Gaza is radicalizing American voters to repudiate the imperialist conduct of U.S. power.

“U.S. global power has never been so vulnerable,” he comments as the United States faces its worst internal political crisis since the foundation of the republic in 1776. Lazare points to the failure of the U.S. capitalist system at a pivotal moment when increasing numbers of its young people are more aware and critical of warmongering foreign policy.

As the university protests grow the fascistic response by the U.S. state to crush legitimate protest is only further radicalizing American youth. This is a wake-up call for radical political change in the United States (and other Western states) because all established parties are now exposed as imperialistic and opposed to any form of genuine democracy.

• This article was published at Strategic Culture

Finian Cunningham has written extensively on international affairs, with articles published in several languages. He is a Master’s graduate in Agricultural Chemistry and worked as a scientific editor for the Royal Society of Chemistry, Cambridge, England, before pursuing a career in newspaper journalism.

  

Russian Media: Russia And China In Run-Up To Battle For Kazakhstan – OpEd

 May 6, 2024  

By Akhas Tazhutov

Kamran Bokhari, senior director of Eurasian Security and Prosperity at the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy in Washington, in his recent piece entitled “Kazakhstan and U.S. Strategy” and published by The National Interest, said: “Central Asia, a vast land-locked area between Russia and China, deserves far more U.S. attention than it currently gets. Greater U.S. engagement with the region can help counter Russia’s aggression against Ukraine. Similarly, U.S. efforts to compete with China can get a boost given that this region is critical for Chinese geo-economic prowess. At the same time, having a robust relationship with the heart of Eurasia will allow America to create a pressure point for Iran, which is aggressively trying to alter the security architecture of the Middle East. Furthermore, it will enable the United States to ensure that Taliban-run Afghanistan does not become a haven for transnational jihadist agendas at a time when the Islamic State is on the rise again”.

The author’s estimation of an American would-be strategy for the Central Asian region appears quite realistic. The only question that appears to remain unanswered in his piece is the following: what would be the concrete path of moving forward to accomplish the noted objectives? This is just where a hitch is when it is a question of really challenging Russia’s traditional clout and China’s rapidly growing influence in Central Asia. After all, if one power intends to create a pressure point in a region or a country, located in the rear of its two most significant power rivals, it has to have reliable access to them. That is the very thing it should get first to ensure the delivery of what that region or country seeks from it and what it can offer them. But there is a problem with that in the present case.

Central Asia including Kazakhstan is inaccessible to the West, except through Azerbaijan and the Caspian Sea. Its other surrounding countries – Russia, China, Afghanistan, and Iran – can hardly be called Western-friendly. The situation gets worsened by the fact that the waterway through the Caspian from Central Asia to the South Caucasus and vice-versa may also be seen as being controlled by Russia, as the Russian Caspian Flotilla is the largest and most powerful naval group in the Caspian Sea basin. That is hampering or even blocking Central Asia’s accessibility for the USA and its allies through Azerbaijan and the Caspian Sea is quite within Russia’s power in the worst scenarios.

It cannot be said that the West did not try to lead Central Asia out of control of Russia in terms of logistics. In the later stages of the Western coalition’s stay in Afghanistan, there were efforts made by Washington to create conditions for establishing economic and trade ties bypassing Russia, China, and Iran that would connect the post-Soviet Central Asian region to the markets in South Asia and beyond. Before the summer of 2021, such plans were repeatedly discussed during the meetings within the framework of the C5+1 format. The New Delhi Times, in an article by Himanshu Sharma entitled “US to link South & Central Asia” (July 20, 2020), said: “The United States and five Central Asian countries pledged to “build economic and trade ties that would connect Central Asia to markets in South Asia and Europe”. Their joint statement in Washington in mid-July called for a peaceful resolution of the Afghan situation for greater economic integration of the South and Central Asian regions”. Among other things, they included a project for building railway links between [post-Soviet] Central Asia and Pakistan.

Now, the latter seems to be getting more concrete. Kazakh Deputy Prime Minister Serik Zhumangarin, while having a meeting with Taliban officials in Afghanistan on April 24,   stated that Kazakhstan was interested in participating in the construction of the Trans-Afghan Railway project. The interesting point here is that Russia expressed interest in the same thing even earlier. The Russian Federation is ready to take on part of the financing of the work and the preparation of a feasibility study of the project. It is claimed that Russia, which is now under sanctions restrictions, is interested in developing a new transport corridor since it gives it additional access to the world’s oceans. The above reports would seem to indicate that the eastern route of the North-South Corridor, a planned railway route that is meant to connect Russia to the Indian Ocean via Central Asia and Afghanistan, is gaining relevance in Moscow’s international agenda. That is, it can be assumed that the Russian side plans to control that route in one way or another, once it becomes operational. This seems to be, by no means, what Washington and its allies wanted for Central Asia to be done.

It means that in terms of independent access to Central Asia, the US and its allies still have no choice but to continue to count on the trans-Caspian direction. In that context, all further plans for the development of transport and logistics between the West and Central Asia without involving Russia and, to a lesser extent, Iran, find themselves linked to the Caspian Sea ports of Aktau and Kuryk in the Mangystau province, located in the south of Western Kazakhstan. Of all the countries in the region, only Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan have access to the Caspian Sea. The port of Turkmenbashi in Turkmenistan is much closer to the port of Baku in Azerbaijan and much farther away from Russian territorial waters, than Aktau and Kuryk. Yet it seems doubtful that Turkmenistan which pursues a policy of neutrality, can be involved in the actions related to the great powers rivalry in the Central Asian region. As regards the formal position, the Turkmen officials have never expressed positions regarding Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But informally, they have been and are being seen as more inclined towards supporting Russia over the West. According to Azattyq, in Turkmenistan, “officials have carried out pro-Kremlin propaganda efforts, blaming the West for provoking the war in Ukraine and warning against foreign ‘agents’ who are allegedly trying to destabilize the country”. Turkmenistan’s representative to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), Khemra Amannazarov, left the conference room during the speech of Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba at a meeting of the OSCE Council of Ministers on December 1, 2022. He returned after the latter had finished his speech. 

No Kazakh official would afford things like that. Astana’s representatives try to behave utterly correctly towards both the West and Russia. The result is that both in Russia and the West, there are often those who suspect Kazakhstan of playing a double game. Kazakhstan has faced repeated accusations by opponents of Putin of helping Russia obtain sanctioned goods that can be used to aid Moscow’s war effort in Ukraine despite Astana’s vows to avoid helping Moscow circumvent Western economic penalties.  Symmetrically, there have been accusations by supporters of Putin toward the Central Asian nation of assisting activities of the West against Russia. There is no point in giving examples – there are a lot of them. To tell the truth, the current system of relations within the triangle of Russia – Kazakhstan – the USA, and its allies seems to suit the Russian leadership just fine. The Kremlin’s propagandists continue – largely because of inertia – to blame the Kazakh ruling regime for many alleged sins against Russia. 

But at times some of them start revealing things. Thus, just recently, one of the mouthpieces of Russian state propaganda has publicly claimed that “Tokayev is a product of Moscow” and “the fact that Kazakhstan, at the very least, helps Russia bypass sanctions is, I repeat, not the country’s State policy, but Tokayev’s personal merit. If he leaves, all this will be over”.

Hence the conclusion suggests that the Kremlin is not too worried about the Kazakh regime’s alleged flirting with the West. There does not yet appear to be a substantial change in relations within the triangle of Russia – Kazakhstan – the USA, and its allies. Even if there is any, it is most likely not in favor of the West. The Kremlin seems to be aware that it still takes the upper hand in relations within that triangle. The only thing that can worry it in this regard is any possible attempts by the West to gain a foothold on the Kazakhstani coast of the Caspian Sea – in the ports of Aktau and Kuryk. It can be assumed that in the event of the slightest suspicion on this account, the Russian Federation, as the former head of the National Security Committee of Kazakhstan, Alnur Musayev noted, may “attack Kazakhstan to cut off the Central Asian nation from the Caspian Sea – from Astrakhan [a city in the Russian Federation] to Aktau [a city in Kazakhstan] and to the border with Turkmenistan”. 

It’s an entirely different story when it comes to relations within the triangle of Russia – Kazakhstan – China. In there, that is Beijing which is taking the upper hand, and Russia is losing its position. In this context, one news report appears to be worthy of special attention. This is the statement by the Kazakh Minister of Trade and Integration, Arman Shakkaliev, about China having come out on top among Kazakhstan’s trading partners, surpassing Russia.

In terms of trade with Kazakhstan, China, according to Chinese figures, for the first time bypassed Russia a decade and a half ago. According to the Kazakh statistical data, this first happened only in 2023. The discrepancies in Kazakhstan-China trade turnover value can perhaps be attributed to differences between the methods of keeping statistics. But, in truth, such an explanation sounds quite unconvincing, as the data of the parties varied and is still varying widely. For instance, China was Kazakhstan’s largest trade partner in 2023, with bilateral trade turnover reaching $41 billion, a 32% increase over the previous year’s total, according to Chinese figures. The Kazakhstan side, meanwhile, reported total bilateral trade in 2023 as totaling $31.5 billion, while the volume of trade between Kazakhstan and Russia amounted to $26  billion.

But anyway, one can talk about China starting to economically squeeze Russia out of Kazakhstan. Moscow can’t stop this, without being dragged into a direct conflict, as China shares a 1,783-kilometer border with Kazakhstan and does not need to turn to Russia’s logistical mediation. Central Asia remains the only region in the post-Soviet space where Russia still maintains a major influence. And if the Kremlin loses its significant clout over what happens in Kazakhstan, the rest of Central Asia will be mostly cut off from Russia, and Moscow will become dependent on Astana in developing its relationship with the other Central Asian countries.  This seems to have to look like an even more alarming prospect.

Therefore, it is not surprising that some Russian military and political experts (topwar.ru) are beginning to say that “Russia and China now are in the run-up to the battle for Kazakhstan”.

Locations of Kazakhstan's Tengiz, Karachaganak, and Kashagan. Credit: EIA, U.S. Energy Information Administration, U.S. State Department, IHS EDIN, KazMunaiGas, Transneft, CPC, BP, OGJ

Akhas Tazhutov is a political analyst from Kazakhstan.

Colorado dispensary and doctor discuss concerns surrounding move to reclassify marijuana

While small business owner worries about corporations entering the cannabis industry, local doctor believes the reclassification means all marijuana would be considered medical.

Following The Associated Press report that the DEA will move to reclassify marijuana from a Schedule I drug to a Schedule III drug, certain concerns have arisen in Colorado about what the change could mean.




By: Colette Bordelon
Posted May 06, 2024

DENVER — Following The Associated Press report that the DEA will move to reclassify marijuana from a Schedule I drug to a Schedule III drug, certain concerns have arisen in Colorado about what the change could mean.

The proposal would not federally legalize marijuana.

Austin Martinson is the owner of Karmaceuticals, which prides itself on being a small business.

“It's kind of, one of the best things that could have happened, is making it a Schedule III because that makes it a little bit easier. It may not open up banking, it might open up banking, we'll see if the SAFER Banking Act actually passes," said Martinson.

However, Martinson is concerned the reclassification would open up the cannabis industry to large corporations.

“It's just going to be sad if we see another industry turn into the Big Five, corporate giant takeover. Whereas this one, we've still got, almost everyone's local and small. Almost every owner is local and small in cannabis in every state, which is a beautiful thing. So I guess, we'll see how it goes. It's too early to tell right now," said Martinson.

Proposal to reclassify marijuana met with excitement, questions and hope in CO

Martinson believes the reclassification could be a stepping stone to federal legalization of cannabis.

“Full legalization, with no regulations, is going to be bad for local businesses," said Martinson, who acknowledged it would be beneficial to have the ability to sell products across state lines.

Dr. John Williams, who is board-certified in preventive medicine and the occupational medicine specialty, believes the new classification for marijuana would force it into the medical realm. A Schedule III classification would recognize the medical uses of cannabis.

“I don't see how any marijuana, if this goes through, won't be classified as medical now. And I don't think that was necessarily the intent," said Williams. “There is a misconception that physicians in Colorado already prescribe marijuana. What they can do is give a person an endorsement for a medical marijuana card, but that's not the same thing as a prescription.”

Williams worries the move could hurt recreational marijuana sales in Colorado.

“The tax revenue, whether you're for or against medical marijuana or any recreational, it does benefit the state," said Williams. “I think physicians are going to be hesitant to write prescriptions. I think malpractice insurance companies may step back and say, 'Look, I'm not going to cover you for writing a prescription for that.' And pharmacies may say, 'Look, maybe we don't want to handle a drug like that.'"

Ultimately, Williams said it would be much easier to understand from a medical point of view if marijuana were fully legalized, or kept as a Schedule I drug.

The proposal is not finalized at this point, and would still need to pass through the White House Office of Management and Budget and DEA public comment. Then, according to the AP, an administrative judge would need to review it.

 

Education And Research Bring Rio’s Dolphins Back From Brink Of Extinction – Analysis

 May 6, 2024  0 Comments

By Mongabay

By Sarah Brown and Kashfi Halford 

Just 60 kilometers (37 miles) outside the city of Rio de Janeiro, dozens of Guiana dolphins swim cautiously past the motorboat, cutting through the water’s surface to breathe. Leonardo Flach stands at the bow taking photos to later identify individuals based on their dorsal fins. With a clear sea and surrounding forest-covered mountains, the landscape of Sepetiba Bay is scenic, yet the water is anything but pristine.

The Guiana dolphin is “the most common dolphin species in Brazil, but at the same time, one of the most endangered,” Flach, a biologist and co-founder of the nonprofit Instituto Boto Cinza (Guiana Dolphin Institute), told Mongabay. He’s studied Guiana dolphins in Sepetiba Bay since the 1990s to understand the dangers they face and to find solutions to protect them.

One of the main threats to these dolphins is chemical pollution in the sea. Flach was part of a recently published that found high toxin concentrations in Guiana dolphins (Sotalia guianensis) over a 12-year period in Sepetiba Bay, the result of dredging, industrial pollution and raw sewage. Up to 80% of sewage from the region is untreated and pumped into the bay, Flach said, contaminating the sea with pathogens and pharmaceuticals that are passed through urination.

“[Rio de Janeiro’s] Guiana dolphins, which live in semi-enclosed bays, are among the most contaminated in the world,” Mariana Alonso, a professor at the Biophysics Institute at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, who was not involved in this study, told Mongabay.

The exposure to these chemicals is linked to altered hormones and problems with the reproductive and immune systems in Guiana dolphins, the study found, leading to greater susceptibility to infectious diseases. A virus outbreak from November 2017 to March 2018 among the Guiana dolphins was unusually deadly: At least 277 dolphins died, wiping out nearly a quarter of the Sepetiba Bay population as well as 6% of the Guianas in the neighboring Ilha Grande Bay.

“The virus was more lethal because it spread among a population that was already in poor health,” Flach said.

The Guiana dolphin is particularly vulnerable to contaminated water because it exhibits what is known as “site fidelity” and rarely, if ever, leaves the place where it was born. This means that no matter how polluted the water is, the Guiana dolphin will remain there, despite the impact on its health.

Flach studies Guiana dolphins in both Sepetiba Bay and neighboring Ilha Grande Bay, a popular tourist spot. Although Ilha Grande waters are more pristine than Sepetiba’s and the area has less industry, the sea still gets contaminated from oil companies and pollution coming from Sepetiba Bay. High levels of mercury have also been recorded there, Alonso said, although research hasn’t yet confirmed if it occurs naturally or is linked to industrial pollution.

Once present throughout Rio de Janeiro in their thousands, Guiana dolphins have dwindled as urban expansion has soared. Of the three bays where the Guiana dolphin resides — Sepetiba, Ilha Grande and Guanabara — the worst affected is Guanabara Bay, the famous stretch of sea visible from Rio’s iconic Christ the Redeemer and Sugarloaf. In the 1980s, more than 400 Guiana dolphins lived in Guanabara. Now, fewer than 30 remain.

Saving Rio de Janeiro’s most polluted bay

Guanabara Bay has a total water surface of 328 square kilometers (127 square miles) and is one of the most populated areas in South America, supporting about 11 million people. It’s also surrounded by the second-largest industrial concentration, with nearly 10,000 industries, including chemicals, as well as 16 oil terminals and 12 shipyards. A2017 study describes the development in Guanabara as “uncontrolled with limited or no planning for sustainability.”

Guiana dolphins living in Guanabara Bay face constant daily threats from industrial toxins, raw sewage and noise pollution from ships that interfere with the dolphins’ sonar. This combination causes chronic stress, which impacts the dolphins’ immunity and reproductive systems, Rafael Carvalho, a biologist at the Laboratory of Aquatic Mammals and Bioindicators (MAQUA) at the State University of Rio de Janeiro, told Mongabay.

Females in the bay have been observed without ever having offspring, despite having reached sexual maturity years before, which means they likely had difficulties in reproducing, Carvalho said. For those that do manage to reproduce, their calves are faced with a “very low” chance of survival, he added.

“That’s exactly what these chemical components do to the health of the animal,” Carvalho said. “It prevents reproduction. That’s why there’s been a big decline in the population in the last few years.”

Cleaning Guanabara Bay and reducing daily pollution is an enormous task and requires a multipronged solution. But progress is being made. Águas do Rio, a water and sewage service company in Rio de Janeiro, implemented a series of infrastructure and technology developments in Guanabara Bay in the last two years, preventing 82 million liters of sewage from being poured into the sea, according to a statement the company sent to Mongabay.

Researchers at MAQUA found that a conservation unit created in 1984 in the north of the bay has become a sanctuary for Guiana dolphins, highlighting the importance of protected spaces and the need to create more.

“We realized throughout our monitoring that dolphins have a tendency of spending a lot of time in or near that region to this conservation unit, most likely because this conservation unit has little boat traffic, it has some restrictions on use [such as fishing] and it retains some characteristics of better environmental quality,” Carvalho said.

Research to protect the Guiana dolphin

One way of understanding the threats to dolphins is to analyze carcasses to find out what killed them and what condition they were in before they died. But to get a clearer picture of the health of the current population, researchers need to analyze live specimens.

Over in Sepetiba Bay, Flach puts away his camera and balances a small harpoon-like device against his body. Observing the school of dolphins, he takes aim and fires a small arrow into the group, causing a commotion of splashing as it hits one and immediately drops into the water. With a whoop of triumph, Flach bends over the boat, scoops the arrow out of the water, and plucks off the blob of fat and skin at the end.

The biopsy causes mild discomfort, but it’s not harmful, Flach said. For researchers, this cluster of flesh is a valuable source of information to determine the sex of the dolphin and measure the toxic accumulations and pathogens in its blubber. Flach places it into a test tube, where it will be sent to researchers at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro to analyze its contents.

Another way to monitor the dolphin population is through photos. In his office in the State Park of Cunhambebe Center in Sahy, near Sepetiba Bay, Flach has thousands of images taken of Guiana dolphins’ dorsal fins as they broke the water’s surface.

Each fin is unique like a human fingerprint, and the photos allow him to keep track of dolphin numbers. He also records the dolphins that get caught up in fishing nets and drown. Bycatch, when marine animals such as dolphins or turtles get accidentally trapped in nets set for fish, is another threat to Guiana dolphins and kills up to eight dolphins per month in Rio de Janeiro.

Flach’s research and activism helped lead to the creation of a 250 km2 (97 m2) protected marine reserve in Sepetiba Bay, which prohibits industry and predatory fishing. He also coordinated courses that awarded local young people a boat driving license, providing them an alternative income to fishing by guiding wildlife tours, such as dolphin watching, instead.

“We have to provide an alternative type of activity so that they can maintain their activities at sea and make a living at the same time without harming others and the marine ecosystem,” Flach said.

The move to ecotourism enhances the relationship between local communities and dolphins by making dolphins economically valuable and boosting the incentives to protect them and their environment. It also provides a way of making a decent income since industrial fishing has drastically reduced fish stocks, as well as ensuring traditional communities remain intact.

“The fish are running out, so the only source of income is for me to work in ecotourism or leave the community to do something else on the mainland,” Renan da Cruz Juvenal, a local fisherman-turned-tour guide, told Mongabay. He lives in a quilombo (a community of descendants of enslaved Africans) on Marambaia Island in Sepetiba Bay and took Flach’s course in 2014.

The combination of research, education and championing for public policies has had a significant impact on the dolphin population in Sepetiba Bay. “We put the brakes on a lot. I believe that if it weren’t for the research on the Guiana dolphin, we would have an increasing mortality rate,” Flach said.

With numbers dwindling across Rio and so few Guiana dolphins left in Guanabara Bay, their existence hangs by a thread. But experts say there is still hope. “You have to believe that there’s a future. And we’re working toward that, for preservation, for the future of this population,” Carvalho said. “If we believe that something’s gone, it’s over.”

• About the authors: Sarah Brown (words) and Kashfi Halford (video)
• Source: This article was published by Mongabay
  

Mongabay
Mongabay is a U.S.-based non-profit conservation and environmental science news platform. Rhett A. Butler founded Mongabay.com in 1999 out of his passion for tropical forests. He called the site Mongabay after an island in Madagascar.