Celebrating Oceans And Exploring Options Of Sustainability With Sudhakar Solomonraj (Report)

Celebrating Oceans And Exploring Options Of Sustainability

With Sudhakar Solomonraj

June 8th, 2021

The PSA commemorated world oceans day by hosting a session on Celebrating Oceans and exploring sustainability options with Sudhakar Solomonraj a professor at Wilson College, Nature Educator & Conservationist. He represented Western Region as part of the Indian team at the Silver Jubilee celebrations of World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) International at Asissi, Italy. He has been associated with the Silent Valley Movement and the Narmada Bachao Andolan. Sanctuary Asia awarded him the ‘Green Teacher’ award in 2010 and he is the author of the book ‘Living Nature'.

The theme of this year's World Oceans Day was 'The Ocean: Life and Livelihoods'. Oceans are considered to be the ‘lungs’ of the planet and are a significant part of our lives.

As per Mr. Sudhakar, ‘’Oceans need to be celebrated like everything else in nature’’
The session consisted of quizzes about the ocean, marine life, and how these affect us.
He suggests that among many ways to identify with nature there are ‘’ocean persons’’, people who feel deeply connected to the ocean. How many of us are ocean persons and what would be our earliest memories of the ocean? He asks.

The Samudrian- Anglicised as Zamorin; was the hereditary monarch of the kingdom of Kozhikode (Calicut) in the South Malabar region of India. Calicut was one of the important trading ports on the south-western coast of India Samudrian meant Guardian or Ruler of the sea.

He suggests that we should all work towards being the ‘Guardians of the sea.’ We should all find ways to celebrate and discover more about our oceans.
Referring to an article by Patrick Manning where he says that, “In the course of their lives interacting with the sea, our ancestors put recurring energy into representing the waters they sailed and the watercraft they built. In paintings, sculptures, petroglyphs, photographs, and models, many generations have created representations of the maritime side of human existence. The paintings and sketches in this vast repository remind the viewer of the oceanic expanse, drawing our eyes to great distances – to the horizon at least as much as to the foreground’’, Mr. Sudhakar added that oceans have been an important part of our culture, history. Humans who have bonded with the oceans can navigate their way through it.

Through a series of the quiz, he asked about various aspects of marine life. Eg. The length of India’s coastline, various species found in our oceans, different types of plants, and so on.

India boasts of several marine national parks which are hotspots of biodiversity and home to several marine creatures including Olive Ridley sea turtles, saltwater crocodile, and a medium-sized marine mammal is known as Dugong. He highlighted the importance of the 6 Marine National Parks in India-Malvan Marine Sanctuary is the only marine sanctuary located in Malvan Taluka of Sindhudurg district in the Konkan region of Maharashtra.

Marine National Park in the Gulf of Kutch is situated on the southern shore of the Gulf in the Jamnagar of Gujarat. It is the first national park of India with 42 islands on the Jamnagar coast in the Marine National Park.

Gahirmatha is the first and the only Marine Sanctuary of Orissa, number of marvellous creatures including Olive Ridley sea turtles migrate in huge numbers. Mahatma Gandhi Marine National Park is a national park of India on the Andaman Islands, Situated 29 km from Port Blair. Most of the coral reefs in the park are fringing reefs (these are the reefs that grow directly from ashore) and the park is an important breeding ground for turtles.

Rani Jhansi Marine National Park is located in The Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal. 

Tamil Nadu also has a marine national park named the Gulf of Mannar Marine National Park. Consisting of 21 small islands and adjacent coral reefs. 

Whereas the marine environment receives our interest for exceptional reasons, the reality stays that a constant growth in the degree of pollution has degraded our water bodies internationally to degrees of irreparable damage. Studies explain that eighty percent of marine pollutants originate on land, in exceptional varieties of pollution, often because of numerous human activities. However, plastics infection poses the largest threat, the listing of pollutant to the marine surroundings stay lengthy with sewage, pesticides, commercial chemicals, and dierent garbage global warming is inflicting changes in ocean chemistry and plenty of oceanic processes, and it's far threatening many species of marine animals that can not deal with better temperatures.

There are about 210000 species of fishes, approximately 400 species of sharks of which the smallest one being 7 cm known as dwarf lantern shark, which can fit into a human hand. The largest Shark is the Whale Shark which has been known to get as large as 18 metres. There are around 300 species of octopuses and 38 species reported from the Indian Sea.

Fishes are an essential export commodity in countries like Peru, China, Japan among others. Overfishing, therefore, has become a critical hassle in many components of the world.

The Jakarta Mandate 1995 on Marine and Coastal Biological Diversity is part of the Ministerial Statement on the Implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity, which was adopted by the Conference of the Parties at its second meeting and signifies a global consensus on the importance of marine and coastal biological diversity. It is important as it looks at the sustainable management of biodiversity.

Thomas Kocherry was an Indian activist who lived from 1940 to 2014. He was an Indian lawyer and a Jesuit priest. Not only that, but he was also the President of the Fisherfolk Federation of India. He was dubbed "a senior sage of India's environmental and social justice movements" by the New Internationalist for his efforts in fighting for the rights of traditional fisherman in India. Ramponkars agitation in Goa is a classic case of exploitation of marine resources.

Local communities play an important role in the conservation of their locality which directly or indirectly affects their livelihoods, therefore it becomes important to include them in the decision-making process.

Researchers discovered that peaks in atmospheric CO2 and low points in global ice volume tend to coincide with periods of more strong monsoon winds and rainfall. Monsoon intensity was also influenced by cyclical changes in Earth's orbit, which affect the quantity of sunlight received by each hemisphere, although these factors alone could not explain monsoon variability. Taken together, the findings suggest that monsoons are indeed sensitive to CO2-related warming, which validates climate model predictions of strengthening monsoon concerning higher CO2.

Over 100 species in the Antarctic have adopted and developed anti-freeze glycoprotein. Antifreeze proteins (AFPs) or ice structuring proteins (ISPs) are a type of polypeptide generated by animals, plants, fungi, and bacteria that allows them to survive in temperatures below freezing which is fascinating.

Warming of the surface ocean from human-induced climate change is likely fueling more powerful cyclones. Dhanushkodi is a ghost town on the south-eastern edge of Pamban Island in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. The town was completely destroyed by the cyclone that hit Rameswaram in 1964, and it has been deserted since then. Cyclones can severely affect both life and livelihoods, Cyclone Gaja that hit Tamil Nadu in 2018 knocked down more than crore coconut trees where each coconut tree has a yearly value of Rs 500 to 2500 per tree, which is essential for the people there.

Many marine scientists consider overfishing to be the worst impact humans are having on the oceans. To help maintain the ocean's fisheries healthy, understanding what seafood can be consumed sustainably, whether it's the species or the technique by which it's caught, is essential.

The issue of ghost fishing is most common with passive gear that has been abandoned, and also poses a serious threat to other ocean vessels.
The oceans are rising and warming more quickly than expected. Despite the fact that oceans span 71% of our world, we continue to ignore them, endangering the numerous creatures that call them home and contaminating one of our most valuable resources.

Our journey towards becoming a Samudrian needs small and essential steps one by one. Coastal warriors like Afroze Shah have been an important part of this and one can learn and work under people like him. Discarding fishing nets after use, reducing plastic waste, disposing of untreated waste, decreasing use of detergents and soaps which increases the number of nitrates and phosphates in the sea and so on are the steps where one can begin their journey.

Songs Played - Promise by Olivia Newton-John and Calypso by John Denver.
Movies/ Documentaries / Books recommended- 2000 leagues under the sea, Old man and the Sea, Three men in a boat, The Tempest, The Odyssey, The North Water

- Report drafted by Sana B Khan, President, PSA