Cape Coast hosts World Oceans Day commemoration

This year's World Oceans Day has been commemorated in Cape Coast with a call on fishermen to eschew the use of chemicals in fishing. 

The Central Regional Director for the Fisheries Commission, Nettesheim Kwame Damoah, stated that it was becoming increasingly worrying that fishermen were resorting to the use of harmful chemicals to increase their catch.

This, he observed, not only reduced fish populations, but also disrupted marine habitats and posed long-term risks to marine life and human health. 

Oceans Day

World Oceans Day, celebrated annually on June 8, highlights the ocean's vital role and humanity's connection to the sea, raising awareness of ocean protection. This year's commemoration was on the theme: "Stakeholder’s participation in catalysing action for our ocean and climate.”

The day was commemorated under the Sustainable Oceans Project, funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Corporation and implemented by EJF, Hen Mpoano, Friends of the Nation, and the Central and Western Fishmongers Improvement Project.

The three-year initiative from 2022 to 2025 aims to create a resilient and sustainable ocean economy in Ghana through inclusive planning and effective coastal management, focusing on reducing fish stock decline, improving fishing community incomes, and addressing climate change impacts on the fisheries sector.

Mr Damoah underscored the importance of the ocean's invaluable resources, emphasising that the ocean was critical to human sustenance, economic opportunities creation, climate regulation and biodiversity.

However, he warned that the over exploitation of the ocean jeopardised those benefits. Concerns were also raised about mining activities near sea sites, leading to severe pollution and habitat destruction.

Stop repletion

The Project Coordinator for the Sustainable Ocean Project of the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF), Theophilus Boachie-Yiadom, noted that if nothing was done to stop the repletion of the oceans’ resources, the effect could be devastating on communities and economies that depended on the ocean.

He, therefore, appealed to all fishers to change their behaviour to adopt proper sea management practices to ensure a sustainable future.

A chief fisherman at Egyaa, Nana Kwame Yah Ababio II, commended the government's efforts to protect the sea through regulations but appealed for the inclusion of stakeholders to help protect the ocean.