The marinas and tourist ports of Spain, as part of the Libera network, want to participate in the protection of the sea. Therefore, they have carried out training to know the guidelines to follow on how and when to act to protect marine fauna, in this case turtles. Libera is an SEO / BirdLife project in partnership with Ecoembes.
The person in charge of the presentation, Ricardo Sagarminaga, is the founder of the NGO Alnitak, and has created under the slogan Todos por la Mar and the Libera flag, a pioneering project of concerted action. A project that unites marinas and tourist ports, sailors and fishermen to actively collaborate in the conservation of the sea. The specific objective is to save the turtles that get caught up in ghost fishing. It is about ropes, nets and drifting garbage that become a threat to marine fauna, as well as to safety at sea and for legal fishing. Thus, both for the removal of ghost fishing devices and for the rescue of sea turtles, the involvement of the nautical tourism sector and fishermen is necessary.
From the ports they can get involved giving information to fishermen and sailors, also prevent the loss of fishing gear, as well as help in the removal of dangerous artifacts that are in the sea. In addition, it is important to have a record of data on illegal and ghost fishing to be able to act later. Finally, act quickly in the rescue of sea turtles. When it comes to finding an enmeshed or endangered turtle, the 112 phone responds quickly and notifies the relevant authorities. The turtle can also be kept in a holding tank until it is transferred to the recovery center and finally, once recovered, it is released again.
The Alnitak project requires collaboration to be able to manage the risk of ghost fishing with the collaboration of public administrations, Civil Guard patrol boats, port authorities, research centers and fauna recovery, as well as professional and recreational fishermen, sailors and diving centers. "In some way, we are all part of the garbage problem, but we are also part of the solution and for that we have to raise awareness among the population and that happens through those who are in the sea", pointed out Gabriel Martínez, president of Feapdt .
The coordinator of the Libera Project, Miguel Muñoz, recalled that garbage is any waste that we find in the sea, and more than half of it is plastic. It is estimated that plastics would take hundreds of years to degrade. And all this rubbish is a serious problem for the marine environment because it can cause entanglement that leads to suffocation and amputation.
