Articles by Andrew Sharpless

This week in ocean news

Some 1,700 acres of English coast will be transformed from farmland to a saltwater marsh at a cost of £12 million (about $24.4 million) ...

... researchers tagged and released bluefin tuna in the western Atlantic in an attempt to track the species' perilous decline ...

... a Silicon Valley company is developing a way to eliminate excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by consuming it during the production of cement, a process known as "carbon sequestering" ...

... rescuers worked five hours to save a basking shark that had washed up on an east Scotland beach, but the shark eventually succumbed ...

Nobel Prize is a nice follow up to Oceana Award

We are thrilled to learn that Al Gore just won the Nobel Prize. As David Roberts points out, he certainly deserved it and this is good news for all of us in the environmental community and in the world.

Gore was also presented with Oceana's 2007 Partners Award this past Friday. The former vice president's work on highlighting the challenges climate change presents to our oceans is incredibly important.

Gore was joined by Dr. Daniel Pauly, winner of the 2007 Ted Danson Ocean Hero award. Pauly is one of the world's preeminent fisheries scientists.

New developments in WTO fisheries subsidies negotiations

Some new ideas by Brazil and Argentina during the Doha round negotiations at the World Trade Organization have left me feeling rather optimistic about the ability of the WTO to actually help address one of the world's biggest environmental problems: global overfishing.

Their proposal is a real attempt by developing countries in the ongoing negotiations about fisheries subsidies to establish some rules to prevent countries from subsidizing their fishing sector without regard to the fish!

The proposal still needs work. But finally, leadership by the developing world to try a find a workable approach to ensure that development keeps the best interest of marine life and habitat in mind while also tending to the needs of people.

European Commission springs to action

For bluefin tuna to have any chance of survival, we've got to make sure proper legislation is in place to protect them and, more importantly, that it's enforced adequately and effectively.

With that in mind, it's a welcome sight to see the European Commission threatening countries like Italy and France with legal action for failing to adhere to fishing quotas and not accurately reporting catches.

The Commission's decision, though welcome, is long overdue.