A small but passionate group gathered on the St. John’s waterfront Sunday afternoon to bring attention to the issue of “ghost nets”.
Lost or abandoned fishing gear is of growing concern globally, as nets and traps continue to fish for decades.
Shawn Bath of Twillingate is the founder of the Clean Harbours Initiative, which organized Sunday’s demonstration. He’s been involved in efforts to recover and remove lost nets and other debris from local harbour.
The group stretched out a 300 X 9 ft. fishing net along the St. John’s harbour front to show the scale and size of some nets.
I’m on the waterfront following a group of protesters from the Clean Ocean Initiative that are trying to bring awareness to the issue of “ghost nets” in the oceans, by putting up a 300’ fishing net along Harbour Drive in St. John’s. @VOCMNEWS pic.twitter.com/ZEEX0ExhET
— AmyFitzpatrickVOCM (@AmyVocm) August 11, 2019
Bath says estimates are that hundreds of thousands to millions of ghost nets are currently fishing in oceans around the world.
He wants to see action to combat the problem. He says fishermen should be able to report when they lose gear and the federal government should hire fishers or use government vessels to retrieve that gear.
