“We’re thrilled to learn of NOAA’s Notice of Intent, as Mallows Bay-Potomac River is now a step closer toward becoming the first National Marine Sanctuary designated in more than 20 years and the first ever in the Chesapeake”, Joel Dunn, president and CEO of the Chesapeake Conservancy, said in a statement.
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Fishermen on Easter Island have complained that illegal industrial fishing trawlers are stealing their tuna, while satellite analysis by NGOs indicated more than two-dozen potential illegal fishing vessels in the area over a year.
President Barack Obama will declare new marine sanctuaries in the tidal waters of Maryland and Wisconsin’s Lake Michigan Monday, while Chile is expected to block off a more than 200,000 square miles of sea from commercial fishing and oil and gas exploration in an area of the Pacific Ocean near the world-famous Easter Island. He also expanded the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, which was originally established in 2009.
The 875-square mile region of Wisconsin’s Lake Michigan reaches out from Port Washington to Two Rivers, containing an accumulation of 39 known wrecks. Of those, 15 are on the National Register of Historic Places.
A second park will be created around the Juan Fernandez archipelago to help rebuild depleted fish stocks.
NOAA is taking comments from the public on the proposed protections until January 15.
Mallows Bay lies south of Washington, DC, along the Maryland shore of the Potomac River in Charles County.
“Our economies, our livelihoods, and our food all depend on our oceans”, President Obama said in a video message shown at the conference, the AP reported.
In 2016, the detection system and alert services will be implemented in Indonesia, the Philippines and three other countries.
The announcement was made at the Our Ocean global marine protection conference in Valparaiso, Chile.
And the Chilean government has also committed to the creation of a marine protected area around Easter Island encompassing more than 600,000 square kilometers, pending the approval of the island’s indigenous Rapa Nui community.
The parks host one of the highest densities of endogenous marine species on the planet.
“We will leave our children a planet as full of possibilities as the one we inherited”.
And the European Union will seek to increase its marine-protected areas from 6 percent of EU territorial waters to 10 percent by 2020, said Karmenu Vella, European commissioner for the environment, maritime affairs and fisheries.
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“The question isn’t whether the ocean matters, and it isn’t whether the ocean is at risk”, said Kerry at the conference on Monday.
