Legambiente
Statement of Legambiente ONLUS to the
Preparatory meeting to the United Nations Conference to Support the Implementation of
Sustainable Development Goal 14: Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine
resources for sustainable development
15-16 February, New York
Distinguished co-facilitators,
We represent Legambiente, the most widespread environmental NGO in Italy. One of the most important topic for our organization is marine environment. In the last 30 years, every summer, we promote a national campaign, called Goletta Verde, all around Italian seas and coasts, monitoring land based pollution like wastewater, coast’s degradation and littering.
Our contribute for Call for Action is a focus on litter in Mediterranean sea and coasts and citizen science activities, within the partnership dialogue MARINE POLLUTION and SPECIFIC TARGET 14.1
Since 2013 Legambiente conduces his activity linked to marine litter and microplastics presence in seas and freshwaters (link). Our international campaign Clean Up the Med involve every year, thousands of volunteers from several Med Countries in cleaning beaches and monitoring beach litter following official protocol (link). It is one of the biggest and successful example of citizen science in Med area and Legambiente’s activities is well recognized at European level, from Unep (link) and US department State too (link).
We also promote actions and policies for prevention, as the PLASTIC CARRIER BAGS BAN in all the Mediterranean areas, based on the Italian ban, launched during the COP22 in Marrakech (Morocco) in collaboration with other environmental organizations (link).
Finally, with particular attention to 1st theme Marine Pollution we consider very important to include in the Call for Action these two issues:
1. Our experience demonstrates how important is the role of citizens science and NGO in monitoring campaign, collecting data, awareness activities and policy actions from local to international level
2. Unep states, “marine litter in the Mediterranean is a confirmed critical issue. The problem is exacerbated by the basin’s limited exchanges with other oceans, its densely populated coasts, highly developed tourism, 30% of the world’s maritime traffic passing through and various additional inputs of litter from rivers and very urbanized areas”. It is imperative to adopt a decisive policy to avoid the huge repercussions on the environment involving all the actors and the countries in the Med Areas.
It’s very important that these two topics will be within the Conference documents and considered in the Call for Action.
Thank you for your attention Giorgio Zampetti g.zampetti@legambiente.it Stefania Di Vito s.divito@legambiente.it
Preparatory meeting to the United Nations Conference to Support the Implementation of
Sustainable Development Goal 14: Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine
resources for sustainable development
15-16 February, New York
Distinguished co-facilitators,
We represent Legambiente, the most widespread environmental NGO in Italy. One of the most important topic for our organization is marine environment. In the last 30 years, every summer, we promote a national campaign, called Goletta Verde, all around Italian seas and coasts, monitoring land based pollution like wastewater, coast’s degradation and littering.
Our contribute for Call for Action is a focus on litter in Mediterranean sea and coasts and citizen science activities, within the partnership dialogue MARINE POLLUTION and SPECIFIC TARGET 14.1
Since 2013 Legambiente conduces his activity linked to marine litter and microplastics presence in seas and freshwaters (link). Our international campaign Clean Up the Med involve every year, thousands of volunteers from several Med Countries in cleaning beaches and monitoring beach litter following official protocol (link). It is one of the biggest and successful example of citizen science in Med area and Legambiente’s activities is well recognized at European level, from Unep (link) and US department State too (link).
We also promote actions and policies for prevention, as the PLASTIC CARRIER BAGS BAN in all the Mediterranean areas, based on the Italian ban, launched during the COP22 in Marrakech (Morocco) in collaboration with other environmental organizations (link).
Finally, with particular attention to 1st theme Marine Pollution we consider very important to include in the Call for Action these two issues:
1. Our experience demonstrates how important is the role of citizens science and NGO in monitoring campaign, collecting data, awareness activities and policy actions from local to international level
2. Unep states, “marine litter in the Mediterranean is a confirmed critical issue. The problem is exacerbated by the basin’s limited exchanges with other oceans, its densely populated coasts, highly developed tourism, 30% of the world’s maritime traffic passing through and various additional inputs of litter from rivers and very urbanized areas”. It is imperative to adopt a decisive policy to avoid the huge repercussions on the environment involving all the actors and the countries in the Med Areas.
It’s very important that these two topics will be within the Conference documents and considered in the Call for Action.
Thank you for your attention Giorgio Zampetti g.zampetti@legambiente.it Stefania Di Vito s.divito@legambiente.it