In the last few weeks I’ve been to Ocean Film Festival and the Blue Earth Summit. At both of these inspiring events Patagonia’s films were part of the conversation, focused on ocean protection and restoration.
Patagonia are calling for European governments to end bottom trawling, starting with an immediate ban in marine protected areas and inshore zones. They are asking everyone to sign the petition to end bottom trawling at eu.patagonia.com
It felt like it was a good time to revist these films, incase you missed them when the campaign was launched this summer. They’re worth watching so take a few minutes out of your day and get involved, it could make a world of difference. Small changes can be one step towards big changes which will leave the planet in a better place.
Louise Searle
Patagonia have launched an global environmental campaign, focused on ocean protection and restoration. Through a series of films, website, petition, and events across Europe, Patagonia will mobilise individuals and call on governments to end bottom trawling.
Connecting us through food, culture and sport, our shared ocean is the home of amazing, abundant life, and is also a powerful climate solution. Yet the practice of bottom trawling threatens to destroy this precious resource—bulldozing our ocean floor, undermining small-scale fisheries, and deepening the climate crisis.
Bottom trawling is one of the most damaging practices that humans inflict on our oceans, destroying seabed ecosystems, overfishing, and indiscriminately killing everything from turtles and rays to sharks.
It has an enormous climate impact too. Dragging nets along the seabed uses more fuel and produces four times more emissions than other types of fishing. It disturbs carbon-absorbing sediment and eradicates the marine plants and animals that take in carbon from the atmosphere. Oceans absorb a quarter of all the carbon dioxide that we produce, yet the practice of bottom trawling threatens to destroy this precious resource. We must protect our ocean so it can protect us.
In place of this destructive, industrial practice, Patagonia is using the campaign and films to promote regenerative alternatives such as 3D ocean seaweed farming and restoring seagrass. With small-scale, low impact fishers making up around half of Europe’s fishing workforce, often impacted by bottom trawling, it is also offering them a platform and calling for them to be supported in the necessary transition.
The campaign launches at a critical moment for Europe’s marine protection with an escalating biodiversity crisis and heated debate ensuing on Europe-wide initiatives such as the Nature Restoration Law and Ocean Action Plan.
The series of eight short documentary films will tell the stories of people around the world, from South Korea and Chilean Patagonia to Portugal and Wales, as they take matters into their own hands and show us how we can work with, not against, our ocean.
Beth Thoren, environmental action & initiatives director, EMEA, Patagonia, says: “Throughout my life, I have always felt connected to the ocean, from my early career as a ship engineer to, later, being a crew mate on a Sea Shepherd boat, fighting whale hunting in Antarctica. But I am not alone. Wherever we are, every second breath we take comes from the ocean. It is imperative that we protect this precious and fragile resource, so it can protect us.
“Our European leaders have the power in their hands to make lasting positive change by stopping bottom trawling and supporting a just transition to practices that restore the ocean. We’re asking ocean defenders everywhere, from surfers, swimmers and those who simply love to walk or paddle at the beach, to coastal communities and fishers, to link arms and send the message that we care.”
Campaign partners for Europe include NGOs Bloom, Blue Ventures, Client Earth, Environmental Justice Foundation, Oceana, and Seas At Risk.
Learn more, get involved and sign the petition at eu.patagonia.com/oceans.
