“There’s nothing wrong with enjoying looking at the surface of the ocean itself, except that when you finally see what goes on underwater, you realize that you’ve been missing the whole point of the ocean. Staying on the surface all the time is like going to the circus and staring at the outside of the tent.”
New limits bring a new hope
Firstly let us define the area of ocean that we are aiming to protect.
In July of 2019 Guernsey FINALLY extended its territorial limit to 12 miles of oceanic waters, in line with nearly every other country on the planet. It should never have taken as long as it did to bring these waters under Guernsey’s jurisdiction but aside from that it now means that the entirety of the Channel Islands waters extends to around ?? square miles.
A much larger area than the previous 3 mile limit which encompassed ?? square miles & a much greater expanse of water to police & protect.
These new limits however do give us a greater control - at government level - over which activities take place in these waters &, theoretically at least, more freedom for projects such as The Ghost Seas Project to get involved in the observation & protection of our newly designated limits.
AS EU fisherman have previously had an almost free reign over these waters it would be naive to assume that they will suddenly steer clear of this new territory & so it is imperative that these new limits are closely monitored to ensure boundaries are being respected.
What are we aiming to protect?
The waters around the Channel Islands are home to a wide range of marine life, encompassing everything from larger marine mammals like dolphins & seals to some of the smallest crustaceans in the oceans, with a wide variety of fish & seaweed species in between. Whilst we may not have the beautiful & vibrant coral reefs so loved by divers & BBC cameramen alike our marine environment is no less beautiful or worthy of protection.
To maintain a healthy ecosystem our waters need to be habitable for all species, from large pelagic fish like porbeagle sharks all the way through to the small bait fish that feed all the other fish above them on the food chain. Given fish stocks are in a constant fight against human overfishing (species’ simply cannot reproduce fast enough to replace depleted numbers before the next trawler sweeps past) doing everything we can to protect spawning & hunting grounds & regulate catches are priority measures for The Ghost Seas Project.
What even lives in our waters?
Additional data sources
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