Sewage
Discharges to Destruction of Coastal Habitats
Top Global Concerns for Oceans and Seas
Good Progress However Scored on Oil and Chemical
Pollution Says New UN Environment Report
The Hague, 4 October 2006 –
A rising tide of sewage is threatening the health
and wealth of far too many of the world’s seas
and oceans, a new report by the United Nations
Environment Programme (UNEP) says.
In many developing countries between 80 per cent
and nearly 90 per cent of sewage entering the
coastal zones is estimated to be raw and untreated.
The pollution-- linked with
rising coastal populations, inadequate treatment
infrastructure and waste handling facilities--
is putting at risk human health and wildlife and
livelihoods from fisheries to tourism.
There is rising concern too
over the increasing damage and destruction of
essential and economically important coastal ecosystems
like, mangrove forests, coral reefs and seagrass
beds.
The problems contrast sharply
with oil pollution. Globally, levels of oily wastes
discharged from industry and cities has, since
the mid 1980s been cut by close to 90 per cent.
Other successes are being scored
in cutting marine contamination from toxic persistent
organic pollutants like DDT and discharges of
radioactive wastes.
The study, called the State
of the Marine Environment report, says overall
good progress is being made on three of nine key
indicators, is mixed for two of them and is heading
in the wrong direction for a further four including
sewage, marine litter and ‘nutrient’ pollution.
Nutrients, from sources like
agriculture and animal wastes, are ‘fertilizing’
coastal zones triggering toxic algal blooms and
a rising number of oxygen deficient ‘dead zones’.
Meanwhile, the report flags
up fresh areas in need of urgent attention.
These include declining flows
in many of the world’s rivers as a result of dams,
over-abstraction and global warming; new streams
of chemicals; the state of coastal and freshwater
wetlands and sea level rise linked with climate
change.
Researchers are also calling
for improved monitoring and data collection on
continents like Africa where the level of hard
facts and figures on marine pollution remains
fragmented and woefully low.
The report has been compiled
by UNEP’s Global Programme of Action for the Protection
of the Marine Environment from Land-Based Sources
(UNEP/GPA).
IGR-2 Beijing
The findings will be given to governments attending
an intergovernmental review of the 10 year-old
GPA initiative taking place in Beijing, China,
from 16-20 October.
Achim Steiner, United Nations
Under Secretary-General and UNEP Executive Director,
said today:” An estimated 80 per cent of marine
pollution originates from the land and this could
rise significantly by 2050 if, as expected, coastal
populations double in just over 40 years time
and action to combat pollution is not accelerated”.
He said the GPA was the key
initiative, backed by the international community,
in order to conserve and reverse declines in the
health of the world’s oceans and seas.
Currently more than 60 countries
across Continents including Africa, Asia and Latin
America and the Caribbean are now part of this
global effort.
Many are integrating the GPA
into national development strategies and some
are working with neighbouring countries to develop
integrated coastal zone management.
“But, as the new State of the
Marine Environment shows, old problems persist
and new ones like nutrient-rich ‘dead zones’ and
the impacts of climate change are emerging. So
we have a long way to go politically, technically
and financially if we are to hand over healthy
and productive seas and oceans to the next generation,”
said Mr Steiner.
He said the Beijing meeting
offered a golden chance for governments and international
donors to review their planning and investment
strategies to ensure they are genuinely marine-friendly.
The UNEP/GPA was adopted by
governments in 1995. It is tasked with assisting
governments in combating nine key coastal problems
which the new report assesses.
Highlights from the State of
the Marine Environment report
The report says good progress has been achieved
in three areas:
Persistent Organic Pollutants-these are long-lived
industrial chemicals, pesticides or by-products
of combustion linked with a wide range of impacts
on human health and wildlife.
Some countries brought in bans
two decades ago and 12 of these chemicals, including
DDT and Polychlorinated Bi-Phenols (PCBs) are
now controlled under the 2001 Stockholm Convention
on Persistent Organic Pollutants.
In the Baltic Sea there has
been a 50 per cent reduction in pollution loads
and levels, especially of DDT, and other pesticides
are also generally falling in the marine environments
of eastern and western South America.
Levels of several key persistent
organic pollutants are dropping too in the Northeast
Atlantic although some contaminants, like PCBs,
continue to be found above European Union limits.
The report points to rivers
such as the Seine in France; the Schedlt and the
Rhine on the border between Belgium and the Netherlands
and the Ems in Germany.
Less sterling progress is being
made in the Arctic, where old and new persistent
organic pollutants enter the human food chain
via fish and seals and in the Western Mediterranean
sea.
The Caspian Sea is also highlighted.
Here, DDT and a chemical called endosulphan are
a “serious cause for concern”.
Concern is also underlined in
some parts of South-East Asia and the South Pacific—here
levels of some persistent chemicals are high in
the river systems and sediments of Malaysia and
Thailand.
High concentrations of DDT and
its breakdown products are found in Papua New
Guinea and the Solomon Islands—the legacy of malarial
mosquito control.
Problems are also underlined
along the coastlines of Sub-Saharan Africa, including
the Indian Ocean where countries are heavily dependent
on agriculture, and the seas of East Asia where
the chemicals are produced.
Radioactive Substances
In 1993, the disposal of low-level
radioactive waste at sea was prohibited under
the London Convention.
Authorized releases from nuclear fuel-cycle installations
do continue at sites such as Sellafield in the
UK; La Hague, France; Trombay, India and Toki-Mura,
Japan.
A potential future problem is
the decommissioning of the Russian nuclear fleet.
But the report concludes that
most contamination is coming from natural radioactive
sources and that measures to control human-made
contamination are working.
Oils
Overall less oil is entering the marine environment
now when compared with the mid 1980s with pollution
down around two thirds.
“Total oil inputs decreased
to 37 per cent of 1985 levels” with spills from
tanker accidents down 75 per cent, from tanker
operations by 95 per cent and from municipal and
industrial discharges by close to 90 per cent.
The report does however note
concern in some areas like the Arctic rivers of
Russia; the Baltic and the Gulf of Finland and
in the Persian Gulf. Asia.
Climate change and the loss
of ice is also opening up the North East Passage
across the roof of the world to shipping and oil
exploration raising the risk of further pollution.
Local pollution is also severe
on coasts and around ports in countries like Bangladesh,
Indonesia, Malaysia, Nigeria and Pakistan as a
result of spills.
The report notes ‘mixed progress’
in two areas.
Heavy Metals
Controls have been introduced by most developed
countries across a wide range of heavy metals.
But new quantities of substance like mercury are
entering the marine environment from emerging
economies as a result of industrial and mining
operations and the burning of fossil fuels for
power generation and transportation.
The report highlights concern
for human health in the Arctic. In some areas
concentrations of mercury are now between two
and to four times higher in the bodies of ringed
seals and beluga whales than 25 years ago.
Other heavy metals—linked with
the deployment of catalytic converters on cars
and including platinum and rhodium—are many times
higher than they were a few decades ago.
“The environmental and health
effect of these metals are not well known,” says
the report.
It says that lead, cadmium and
mercury inputs into the North Sea have fallen
by 70 per cent, although targets for some other
substances like copper and tri-butyl tin—used
as an anti-fouling coating on boats-- have not
been met.
Other areas of progress include
the North East Atlantic where concentrations of
cadmium, mercury and lead in mussels and fish
have fallen over the past decade or so and in
the Mediterranean where a similar trend is emerging.
However concern remains in places
like the Caspian Sea where an estimated 17 tonnes
of mercury and nearly 150 tonnes of cadmium are
discharged annually.
In the seas of East Asia, rising
amounts of electronic wastes—which can contain
up to 1,000 different materials, many of which
are toxic—is an increasing problem with as many
as nine million batteries dumped annually.
Sediment Mobilization
Movement of sediments and soils are being dramatically
altered by dam building, large-scale irrigation,
urbanization, loss of forests and land change
uses linked with agriculture.
Some coastlines, once fed by
regular amounts of sediments by rivers, are shrinking
because the soils are being trapped by barrages
upstream.
Others are suffering for precisely
the opposite reason---artificially high amounts
of sediments are now swilling down rivers choking
seagrass beds, silting up coral reefs and clogging
up other important habitats and coastal ecosystems.
The report points to the Mediterranean
where river flows have been reduced by 50 per
cent as a result of damming thus cutting sediment
flows to the coast.
Soil particle flows in the River
Ebro in Spain have fallen by 95 per cent and from
the Rhone in southern France by 80 per cent.
In South Asia, some 1.6 billion
tones of sediment are now reaching the Indian
Ocean via rivers on the Indian sub-Continent.
Total sediment loads in rivers
in Bangladesh are 2.5 billion tones of which the
Brahamaputra carries 1.7 billion tones and the
Ganges 0.8 billion tones.
In the seas of East Asia the
levels of silt draining into river basins is three
to eight times the global average.
Studies from Indonesia and the
Philippines estimate that the environmental damage
to coral reefs far exceeds the economic benefits
from logging which is triggering the silt.
In the Wider Caribbean, sediment
loads are estimated to be one Giga-tone or 12
per cent of the global level with deforestation
the main trigger.
The economic impact of reduced
loads is starkly underlined on the Nile. The building
of the Aswan dam in the 1960s had led to close
to 100 per cent of the soils and sediments being
trapped behind the dam.
Erosion has occurred at the mouth of the Nile
and there have been declines in sardine catches
of 95 per cent.
Worse Progress is being registered
in four areas:
Sewage
Over half of the wastewater entering the Mediterranean
Sea is untreated.
In Central and Eastern Europe a quarter of the
population are connected to some kind of treatment
plant but many large cities discharge virtually
untreated wastewater.
Around 60 per cent of the wastewater
discharged into the Caspian Sea is untreated.
In Latin America and the Caribbean
the figure is around 85 per cent.
In East Asia the figure is close
to 90 per cent; in the South East Pacific, over
80 per cent and West and Central Africa, 80 per
cent.
In West Asia, among countries
like Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia
and the United Arab Emirates, “sewage treatment
plants exist in all countries, but the level of
treatment varies and capacity is not sufficient
to deal with existing loads”.
Globally, an estimated $56 billion
more is needed annually to address the wastewater
problem.
“On balance, it is perhaps the
most serious of all the problems within the framework
of the GPA. It is also the area where least progress
has been achieved,” says the report.
Nutrients
The number of coastal dead zones has doubled every
decade since 1960 with the rise linked to nutrients—nitrogen
and phosphorus—arising from sources such as agricultural
fertilizer run off; manure; sewage and fossil
fuel burning.
“Nutrient over-enrichment” can
lead to wild and farmed fish kills; degradation
of seagrass beds and coral reefs and toxic algal
blooms.
Nitrogen exports to the marine
environment from rivers are expected to rise globally
by 14 per cent by 2030 when compared with the
mid 11000s.
The problem was once largely
confined to developed countries but is now spreading
to developing ones.
Rivers running through Cambodia, China, Malaysia,
Thailand and Vietnam now deliver well over 600,000
tonnes of nitrogen to the waters above the Sunda
Shelf.
Toxic algal blooms or ‘red tides’
affected 15,000 square kilometers of offshore
waters in China in 2001. Major problems are also
now being registered in the estuaries and coastal
areas of the Philippines.
Marine Litter
“The problem of marine litter has steadily grown
worse, despite national and international efforts
to control it,” says the report.
Impacts include threats to human
health and wildlife. Litter can harm the aesthetic
appearance of beaches and tourist resorts with
economic implications.
Sources include municipal, industrial,
medial, fishing boats and shipping discharges.
Much of the litter is not bio-degradable.
The precise amount of litter
is unknown but thought to be rising. Around 70
per cent of marine litter ends up on the seabed,
15 per cent on beaches and a further 15 per cent
is floating.
The annual ‘International Coastal
Cleanup’ organized by the NGO Ocean Conservancy
collected over six million pieces of rubbish weighing
4,000 tonnes in 100 countries in 2001.
An example of costs comes from
the west coast of Sweden where municipalities
spend over $1.6 million a year cleaning up litter
from 3,600 km of coast.
Physical Alteration and Destruction
of Habitats
Close to 40 per cent of the world’s population
live on just the costal fringe which is just over
seven per cent of the land.
Average population density in
the coastal zone rose is set to rise from 77 people
per square kilometer in 11000 to 115 in 2025.
The growth, in terms of more
settlements, overuse of marine resources, pollution
and damage and loss of ecosystems, is having serious
impacts.
In the North Sea, sand and gravel
extraction is an issue. The sea bed can take up
to a decade to recover.
The impact of new infrastructure is underlined
with a case from Morocco in the Mediterranean.
A new harbour and port, built in the 11000s, changed
the levels of sediments deposited on local beaches.
As a result Tangier lost over
50 per cent of its international tourist night-stays
and local craftsmen lost a quarter of their business.
Close to 90 per cent of coral
reefs in South East Asia are threatened by human
activity and the region’s mangroves—important
for coastal defence and fisheries—are under assault
from aquaculture ponds and agriculture.
Close to a third of North America’s
wetlands have been lost to urban development with
agriculture claiming a further quarter.
Many Caribbean countries have
seen a deterioration of their coastal environments
as a result of sand mining and the construction
of breakwaters and seawalls. The Virgin Islands
(USA) have lost half of their mangroves in the
past 70 years.
Loss of coastal habitats in
Latin America have impacted fisheries. An extreme
case is the 90 per cent reduction in coastal fisheries
in the Magdalena River delta of Colombia over
the last two decades.
Extensive losses of mangroves
in Ecuador and Colombia and salt marshes in southern
Brazil are reported.
Agricultural and urban development has resulted
in an up to 50 per cent loss of wetlands in Southern
and Western Africa while around 80 per cent of
the Upper Guinea forest has been cleared.
Notes to Editors
For more information on the Inter Governmental
Review (IGR-2) in Beijing go to www.gpa.unep.org
The State of the Marine Environment and regional
reports can also be found at http://www.gpa.unep.org/bin/php/igr/igr2/supporting.php
For More Information Please Contact
Nick Nuttall, UNEP Spokesperson, Office of the
Executive Director
Robert Bisset, UNEP Spokesperson for Europe
Elizabeth Solomon, Information Officer, UNEP/GPA
