#fisheries policy

[trendynewsnow]

EU Ministers Set Baltic Sea Fishing Quotas for 2025 Amid Environmental Concerns

EU Ministers Reach Agreement on Baltic Sea Fishing Quotas for 2025 An agreement reached by EU ministers on Tuesday, following extensive overnight discussions, has set cautious total allowable catches (TACs) for commercially significant fish stocks in the Baltic Sea for 2025. This decision comes amid growing concerns that Russian trawlers may take advantage of the situation by disregarding efforts…

[harriswalz4usabybr]

Speech Vice President Harris will give in Juneau, AK!

~BR~

[worldfisheriesday]

Overcome challenges on both the Fish supply and demand sides.

A new UNCTAD study examines the development potential of the fishery sector in selected Least Developed Countries in Africa and Asia, providing policy recommendations to overcome challenges on both the supply and demand sides.

[newsfrompeoplesmovement]

Shifting the burden – two examples

The Trade and Co-operation Agreement between the UK and the EU following Brexit included provision for the transfer of EU fishing quotas to the UK. Forty per cent of the EU quota transferred to the UK came from Ireland, far more than was taken from any other EU Member. The main impact of this arrangement fell on the pelagic sector with mackerel being the main species transferred.  It has been…

[reasonsforhope]

"The U.S. government is entering a new era of collaboration with Native American and Alaska Native leaders in managing public lands and other resources, with top federal officials saying that incorporating more Indigenous knowledge into decision-making can help spur conservation and combat climate change.

Federal emergency managers on Thursday also announced updates to recovery policies to aid tribal communities in the repair or rebuilding of traditional homes or ceremonial buildings after a series of wildfires, floods and other disasters around the country.

With hundreds of tribal leaders gathering in Washington this week for an annual summit, the Biden administration is celebrating nearly 200 new agreements that are designed to boost federal cooperation with tribes nationwide.

The agreements cover everything from fishery restoration projects in Alaska and the Pacific Northwest to management of new national monuments in the Southwestern U.S., seed collection work in Montana and plant restoration in the Great Smoky Mountains.

“The United States manages hundreds of millions of acres of what we call federal public lands. Why wouldn’t we want added capacity, added expertise, millennia of knowledge and understanding of how to manage those lands?” U.S. Interior Assistant Secretary Bryan Newland said during a panel discussion.

The new co-management and co-stewardship agreements announced this week mark a tenfold increase over what had been inked just a year earlier, and officials said more are in the pipeline.

Newland, a citizen of the Bay Mills Indian Community in northern Michigan, said each agreement is unique. He said each arrangement is tailored to a tribe’s needs and capacity for helping to manage public lands �� and at the very least assures their presence at the table when decisions are made.

The federal government is not looking to dictate to tribal leaders what a partnership should look like, he said...

The U.S. government controls more than a quarter of the land in the United States, with much of that encompassing the ancestral homelands of federally recognized tribes...

Tribes and advocacy groups have been pushing for arrangements that go beyond the consultation requirements mandated by federal law.

Researchers at the University of Washington and legal experts with the Native American Rights Fund have put together a new clearinghouse on the topic. They point out that public lands now central to the country’s national heritage originated from the dispossession and displacement of Indigenous people and that co-management could present on opportunity for the U.S. to reckon with that complicated legacy...

In an attempt to address complaints about chronic underfunding across Indian Country, President Joe Biden on Wednesday signed an executive order on the first day of the summit that will make it easier for tribes to find and access grants.

Deanne Criswell, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, told tribal leaders Thursday that her agency [FEMA] began work this year to upgrade its disaster guidance particularly in response to tribal needs.

The Indigenous people of Hawaii have increasingly been under siege from disasters, most recently a devastating fire that killed dozens of people and leveled an entire town. Just last month, another blaze scorched a stretch of irreplaceable rainforest on Oahu.

Tribes in California and Oregon also were forced to seek disaster declarations earlier this year after severe storms resulted in flooding and mudslides...

Criswell said the new guidance includes a pathway for Native American, Alaska Native and Hawaiian communities to request presidential disaster declarations, providing them with access to emergency federal relief funding. [Note: This alone is potentially a huge deal. A presidential disaster declaration unlocks literally millions of dollars in federal aid and does a lot to speed up the response.]

The agency also is now accepting tribal self-certified damage assessments and cost estimates for restoring ceremonial buildings or traditional homes, while not requiring site inspections, maps or other details that might compromise culturally sensitive data."

-via AP, December 7, 2023

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Two Mi'kmaw fishermen who were dropped off in the middle of nowhere in rural Nova Scotia in their sock feet on a cold and rainy March night, their cellphones seized by federal fisheries officers, hope an external investigation will shed some light on the actions of the officers that night. "Even though I went out and did what I did, still at the end of the day, it's wrong what happened to me," said Blaise Sylliboy of the Eskasoni First Nation in Cape Breton, one of the men detained for fishing for elvers at night along a river in Shelburne County early last spring.  Federal Fisheries Minister Diane Lebouthillier announced in a news release Monday morning that an external review process will examine the incident on March 26, 2024, as well as department policies, enforcement practices, and "procedures to eradicate the potential for systemic biases or racism." 

Continue Reading.

Tagging: @newsfromstolenland

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from The Revelator:

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As a legislative policy fellow and anthropologist who studies women’s well-being in coastal communities of Chile and Indigenous salmon management in Alaska and Canada, I’ve witnessed how genocidal attempts to eradicate Indigenous peoples and their cultures have also damaged the environment. We see it in current management’s low returns in fish, high levels of runoff and nutrient input into ocean systems, and generally unsustainable levels of resource extraction.

I’ve also seen the opposite: I interviewed managers and biologists in Vancouver, Canada, who described the substantial improvements of Indigenous-led, bottom-up approaches to conservation. They see fish return and people fulfilling their well-being and nutrition needs. They see political and economic reform and a revitalization of social and cultural practices.

Unfortunately this is still not the norm, as we saw in a recent international agreement between the United States and Canada that placed a seven-year fishing moratorium on Chinook salmon to encourage fish populations to rebound. Most people would agree that this is a worthy goal for the conservation of both the species and the people who depend on Chinook. However, the new agreement fails to factor in Indigenous access to resources for ceremonial and subsistence harvest, which is mandated by law, nor did legislators acknowledge public comment that supported that access.

The marginalization of Indigenous peoples today, as seen in this agreement’s failures, can be traced back to colonialism.

The history of colonialism is steeped in human-rights violations such as the outlawing of Indigenous salmon-management practices that settlers later appropriated for their own economic gain. Settler wealth was achieved only through the exploitation of resources and forced relocation of Indigenous peoples out of economically advantageous spaces and acculturation into oppressive colonial ones.

“Settler governments [are] primarily concerned with economic gain,” a British Columbia-based project manager focused on salmon restoration told me during an interview. “Their mandate is to work commercial fisheries or recreational ones that generate economic value for their states, provinces, or countries…That’s the starting point; when human well-being is the starting point — like it is with Indigenous people — then it leads to a very different kind of management.”

[mbari-blog]

Ocean policy depends on data.

Resource managers and policymakers need robust data about marine ecosystems for decision-making and setting sound policies. An international team of researchers, led by CeNCOOS, has outlined best practices to standardize observations of seafloor invertebrates. 

Measuring body size is critical to harmonizing the diverse types of data that scientists around the world are collecting. Implementing this toolkit will help bridge the gap between science and policy to aid in managing the impacts of fisheries, oil and gas exploration, deep-sea mining, and climate change on marine life. 

This work contributes to the efforts of the Global Ocean Observing System to deliver Essential Ocean Variable information for seafloor invertebrate abundance and distribution. You can read the full story and learn more on our website. 

[pyrrhocorax]

my current hetalia wildlife/natural resources au thoughts i have from your resident wildlife biologist: sweden: i have lots of ideas for him but the idea of him being an entomologist is interesting b/c the contrast of "big scary giant guy, but he studies tiny butterflies" is really fun to me. he has a very entomologist personality to me too based on all the entomologists i know so lepidopterist is my current thought. finland: forester. all foresters i know are unhinged in the same exact way he is unhinged. potentially also a fire ecologist?? i think that would be interesting (give me an excuse to learn about fire ecology more) and i think he would enjoy using a flamethrower. iceland: thinking geologist, prob volcanologist? or he studies auks. norway: less sure of him. thinking mainly about fisheries (not sure if marine or freshwater, both are interesting), mycology, lichenology (this is the main one i am thinking about rn), oceanography, or mountain stream hydrology (yes that is a thing) for him. denmark: having the most trouble with him honestly. maybe meteorology, geography (GIS dude??), soil biology?? maybe even human dimensions (i can see him being a good intermediary between the public and natural resources, like park ranger-esque)?? idk if extension agents exist in europe but he'd be good at that i think. estonia: songbird biologist. bander (or ringer you're european). potentially studying migration trends? breeding output of at-risk species? potentially lab mates with austria b/c sharing same field site. he's uncannily good at mimicking bird calls. lithuania: large carnivore biologist that studies in canids (i.e. wolves), mainly does camera trapping but also darts/radio collars them. looking at habitat usage to hopefully boost populations??? latvia: shorebird/rail/stork biologist?? reminds me of a shorebird biologist i know and i think he'd vibe well with water/water adjacent bird work. i also think him studying beavers is fun because beavers are fun! and i think the riga beaver thing back in the day was hysterical lol OR i think him being an aquatic entomologist would be cool he could be a dragonfly guy austria: also a songbird biologist, but looking at vocalizations/song stuff, does a lot more lab work than field work analyzing vocalizations. maybe studying nocturnal vocalizations during migration of birds across different habitats??? potentially lab mates with estonia. america: ungulates. or maybe specifically cervids. respectfully, as an american, we are overly obsessed with deer. could also see him studying salamanders because they are a special kind of person too that fits the american personality well, and america is home to the most salamander diversity in the world so like. yeah. canada: ducks/loons/grebes, raptors (specifically thinking eagles/hawks), weasels (him being so understated but studying wolverines is funny to me), or fisheries? :/ could also see him being a habitat biologist in general, doing modeling stuff for wider scale land changes? i kind of want him to be a prairie conservationist too. england: botanist is my thought for now? he has a "plant research guy who is 3 years into his phd and kind of regretting his life choices" vibe to me. but he's also the world's crustiest birder outside of his work (b/c uk influenced a lot of the current world birding culture) germany: ngl environmental policy analyst seems up his alley and we need more of those who are good. romania: chiropterist. and before you are like "urg don't stereotype the vampire thing pyrr" it's not that. his personality is just very bat biologist. they are a special kind of people, and i say that with affection, as all the bat people i know are fantastic. specifically could see him being also an entomologist studying the interactions between bats/bugs on farmland to see how bat populations help crop production. still thinking on things though!!! welcome to my niche au.

[thehopefuljournalist]

In the previous post I introduced Greenpeace. These are some wins from June posted on their website.

- Hyundai Construction Equipment commits to help stopping illegal mining in the Amazon

Greenpeace East Asia released the Stop the Excavators report in April of this year, calling to heavy machinery manufacturers to take measures that prevent their equipment being used illegally, in ways that cause violations of human rights.

This exposé revealed that Hyundai Construction Equipment is apparently the favoured brand used in illegal mining in Indigenous Lands in the Amazon.

Hyundai has now announced a series of measures to protect the forest, and will act to prevent this in the future.

- ReconAfrica suspends oil drilling in Okavango Delta

The Canadian oil company ReconAfrica has stopped drilling in Namibia’s Okavango Delta, after it was faced with lawsuits and environmental concerns. For now, the drillings have only been suspended, but this is a step in the right direction, proving that people power can work wonders.

In 2019, ReconAfrica announced fracking in some of Africa's most sensitive (both in terms of water supplies and as livelihoods for the communities in the area) environmental areas. Namibian youth climate activists, indigenous, environmental and human rights groups have been working since then to prevent this from happening.

- ASEAN steps up commitment to end forced labour and human trafficking practices of migrant fishers

In May 2023, ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) leaders officially adopted the first ASEAN Declaration on Migrant Fishers Protection in history. This declaration follows many years of active campaigning by human rights advocates and civil society organizations. The campaign aims to push stronger policies to protect Southeast Asian migrants working in fisheries and their rights.

This declaration emphasised that protecting and fulfilling the rights of migrant fishers is an entire migration cycle (recruitment, placement, and repatriation), and so is a shared responsibility among the ASEAN states.

- Local fishers and civil society join forces to reforest mangroves in Senegal

The local community in the traditional fishing town Joal in Senegal started reforesting mangroves in a show of what direct action is really about.

Joal is located near mangrove forests, that are essential breeding grounds for many fish species, and are vital therefore for the fishing communities in those areas. They also store more carbon than tropical forests, and are capable of curbing climate impacts such as floods.

- Dutch creative agencies choose to no longer work with fossil fuel companies

23+ creative agencies in The Netherlands put together a Fossil No Deal, stating that they will stop working with fossil companies and no longer encourage fossil passenger transport. They call it verdrag verantwoord verleiden, a treaty for responsible seduction.

- Thailand applies new PM2.5 ambient standard

In the beginning of June, the new PM2.5 ambient standard was officially applied in Thailand. 

The new standard is now 15 μg/m3 for the annual standard and 37.5 μg/m3 for 24-hour standard, which is in keeping with the revised WHO air quality guidelines. This is a big step in the right direction to help reduce PM2.5 and solve air pollution in the country.

Greenpeace Thailand is still not at rest, though, and are continuing to fight to get the PM2.5 at its source, that is from the industries.

- In New Zealand, FSC abandons plans for ‘GE learning’ process

Greenpeace Aotearoa and other environmental organizations have been pressuring the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification scheme to abandon its plans for a ‘Genetic Engineering (GE) learning’ process.

The long-standing principle of not certifying GE trees came under threat  after pressure from FSC certified plantation  company Suzano from Brazil that has a subsidiary doing GE eucalyptus tree research trials (for glyphosate resistance). 

- Citizens say yes to net zero emissions in Switzerland

 Swiss citizens have voted in favour of a new law to reach net zero emissions by 2050. The new climate law, which was initiated seven years ago, passed a referendum with about 59% of the voters.

Net zero is now enshrined in the “federal law on climate protection, innovation and strengthening energy security“.

Let me know if there's anything else you'd like to see, news from your own countries, or if you'd like to add anything or share.

I'm also here to listen, my DMs and Asks are always open :)

Love you all, and see you next time, be safe!

[eaglesnick]

“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man's needs, but not every man's greed.” ― Mahatma Gandhi

We know Rishi Sunak would rather he and his cronies made even more money than they already have than save the planet. Even those within the Conservative party acknowledge this fact, and this was BEFORE Sunak decided to issue hundreds of new licenses for oil and gas extraction from the North Sea, or scrap clean air policies for our cities.

“Goldsmith says Sunak is apathetic about the environment. It’s Hard to disagree. Evidence suggests PM has done little to advance green issues and is allowing the UK to fall behind in climate fight.” (Guardian: 30/06/23)

Are people really going to vote for a man who has allowed our waterways and beaches to become polluted by raw sewage? This was a headline from the Mirror newspaper only yesterday:

“Sewage pours into conservation sites including Lake District for 300,000 hours.” (Mirror: 31/07/23)

Back in January the BBC reported this warning from MP’s to Rishi Sunak:

“England's rivers are contaminated by a "chemical cocktail" of sewage, agriculture and road pollution,,,  Microplastics, slurry, car tyre particles, oils and wet wipes are all part of the problem, they said. No English river free of pollution, MPs warn.” (BBC News: 13/01/23)

Clearly, Sunak couldn’t care less as he is advocating more car use, more gas and oil exploration, and has given the privately owned water companies until 2050, to clean up our waterways and coast line.

Even if you are still sceptical about global warming and the lethal consequences this could have for our planet , everyone should care about our rivers and beaches. Two years ago, it was reported “Britain’s rivers are suffocating to death" and that “water pollution (was) causing death by a thousand cuts for rivers”.

In Whitby, there have been “unprecedented levels of crab, lobsters, coral and seabirds…dying on the northeast coast”. (Guardian 10/02/23, while in Kent, Whitstable’s world famous oyster beds are being threatened with extinction from repeated raw sewage discharges into the sea.

“Sewage spills threaten to “wipe out” Whitstable oyster farmers” (The Times: 11/04/23)

Sunak is not interested in you or me. He couldn’t care less about contaminated water, be it inland rivers and lakes or our beaches. He doesn’t care if the waters around our coast are contaminated and dangerous to health, be that human health of the health of marine animals. He doesn’t care for our coastal fisheries or the businesses than make their living from marine farming.

Sunak, a multi-millionaire with a bolthole in sunny California, doesn’t have to live with the consequences of his short-sighted and environmentally damaging actions. It wont be his children paddling in raw sewage. It wont be his children swimming in poisoned waters. It wont be his children who are forced to breathe in polluted air day after day because he has scrapped his own clean air policies. Mr Sunak is an unelected multi-millionaire whose only concern is to make more money for himself and his rich friends. If that means trashing the environment in the process, then so be it – he doesn’t have to live with the consequences. Unfortunately, you and I, and our children and grand children, do.

[harriswalz4usabybr]

Saturday, August 17, 2024 - Kamala Harris

This is the 'official' schedule of Vice President Harris today on the campaign trail, as she travels with Senators Brian Schatz, Jon Tester and US Representative Nanette Barragán. Today's focus of the campaign will be the Last Frontier, the state of Alaska.

Anchorage, AK Event Location: Port of Anchorage Event Type: Listening Tour Event Time: 9:00 - 10:30 AKT

Fairbanks, AK Event Location: University of Alaska Fairbanks Event Type: Get Out the Vote Event Time: 13:00 - 14:30 AKT

Juneau, AK Event Location: Centennial Hall Convention Center Event Type: Campaign Rally Event Time 17:00 - 19:00 AKT

Anchorage, AK This event will invite the aviation, logistics, and port workers as well as local community leaders to come to the port and share issues, ideas, and the like with the campaign. Vice President Harris is particularly interested in learning what her administration could do in terms of regulations to ensure safer labor, but also efficient results so that Alaska can continue to be a high performing state in terms of logistics.

Fairbanks, AK Remarks will be shared on-campus with many student leaders and volunteers to kick-off a door knocking campaign across the state, some community leaders from across the state will join via Zoom. Additionally, Vice President Harris will voice her support for State and Local elections across the country to use Rank Choice Vote like Alaska. Here is a part of that announcement: "Alaska has led the way by implementing Rank Choice Voting, and it’s time the rest of the nation takes note. This system of voting empowers voters, encourages more diverse candidates to run, and ensures that our elected officials truly reflect the will of the people. It's a fairer, more democratic way to vote, and it’s an important step towards strengthening our democracy. Let’s bring the spirit of innovation and fairness that Alaska has shown to the rest of the nation. Together, we can create a political system where every voice is heard, and every vote truly counts."

Juneau, AK Full-text of the speech that Vice President Harris plans to give in the capital city will be shared shortly.

~BR~

[mariacallous]

America’s first large-scale offshore wind farms began sending power to the Northeast in early 2024, but a wave of wind farm project cancellations and rising costs have left many people with doubts about the industry’s future in the US.

Several big hitters, including Ørsted, Equinor, BP, and Avangrid, have canceled contracts or sought to renegotiate them in recent months. Pulling out meant the companies faced cancellation penalties ranging from $16 million to several hundred million dollars per project. It also resulted in Siemens Energy, the world’s largest maker of offshore wind turbines, anticipating financial losses in 2024 of around $2.2 billion.

Altogether, projects that had been canceled by the end of 2023 were expected to total more than 12 gigawatts of power, representing more than half of the capacity in the project pipeline.

So, what happened, and can the US offshore wind industry recover?

I lead the University of Massachusetts Lowell’s Center for Wind-Energy Science, Technology, and Research (WindSTAR) and Center for Energy Innovation, and follow the industry closely. The offshore wind industry’s troubles are complicated, but it’s far from dead in the US, and some policy changes may help it find firmer footing.

A Cascade of Approval Challenges

Getting offshore wind projects permitted and approved in the US takes years and is fraught with uncertainty for developers, more so than in Europe or Asia.

Before a company bids on a US project, the developer must plan the procurement of the entire wind farm, including making reservations to purchase components such as turbines and cables, construction equipment, and ships. The bid must also be cost-competitive, so companies have a tendency to bid low and not anticipate unexpected costs, which adds to financial uncertainty and risk.

The winning US bidder then purchases an expensive ocean lease, costing in the hundreds of millions of dollars. But it has no right to build a wind project yet.

Before starting to build, the developer must conduct site assessments to determine what kind of foundations are possible and identify the scale of the project. The developer must consummate an agreement to sell the power it produces, identify a point of interconnection to the power grid, and then prepare a construction and operation plan, which is subject to further environmental review. All of that takes about five years, and it’s only the beginning.

For a project to move forward, developers may need to secure dozens of permits from local, tribal, state, regional, and federal agencies. The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, which has jurisdiction over leasing and management of the seabed, must consult with agencies that have regulatory responsibilities over different aspects in the ocean, such as the armed forces, Environmental Protection Agency, and National Marine Fisheries Service, as well as groups including commercial and recreational fishing, Indigenous groups, shipping, harbor managers, and property owners.

In December 2023, the majority of offshore wind power capacity was in China and Europe. The United States had just 42 megawatts, but it was about to launch two new wind farms. (Data source: WFO Global Wind Offshore Wind Report 2023.)

For Vineyard Wind I—which began sending power from five of its 62 planned wind turbines off Martha’s Vineyard in early 2024—the time from BOEM’s lease auction to getting its first electricity to the grid was about nine years.

Costs Balloon During Regulatory Delays

Until recently, these contracts didn’t include any mechanisms to adjust for rising supply costs during the long approval time, adding to the risk for developers.

From the time today’s projects were bid to the time they were approved for construction, the world dealt with the Covid-19 pandemic, inflation, global supply chain problems, increased financing costs, and the war in Ukraine. Steep increases in commodity prices, including for steel and copper as well as in construction and operating costs, made many contracts signed years earlier no longer financially viable.

Led by China and the UK, the world had 67,412 megawatts of offshore wind power capacity in operation by the end of 2023. (Source: WTO Global Offshore Wind Report.)

New and rebid contracts are now allowing for price adjustments after the environmental approvals have been given, which is making projects more attractive to developers in the US. Many of the companies that canceled projects are now rebidding.

The regulatory process is becoming more streamlined, but it still takes about six years, while other countries are building projects at a faster pace and larger scale.

Shipping Rules, Power Connections

Another significant hurdle for offshore wind development in the US involves a century-old law known as the Jones Act.

The Jones Act requires vessels carrying cargo between US points to be US-built, US-operated, and US-owned. It was written to boost the shipping industry after World War I. However, there are only three offshore wind turbine installation vessels in the world that are large enough for the turbines proposed for US projects, and none are compliant with the Jones Act.

That means wind turbine components must be transported by smaller barges from US ports and then installed by a foreign installation vessel waiting offshore, which raises the cost and likelihood of delays.

Dominion Energy is building a new ship, the Charybdis, that will comply with the Jones Act. But a typical offshore wind farm needs more than 25 different types of vessels—for crew transfers, surveying, environmental monitoring, cable-laying, heavy lifting, and many other roles.

The nation also lacks a well-trained workforce for manufacturing, construction, and operation of offshore wind farms.

For power to flow from offshore wind farms, the electricity grid also requires significant upgrades. The Department of Energy is working on regional transmission plans, but permitting will undoubtedly be slow.

Lawsuits and Disinfo

Numerous lawsuits from advocacy groups that oppose offshore wind projects have further slowed development.

Wealthy homeowners have tried to stop wind farms that might appear in their ocean view. Astroturfing groups that claim to be advocates of the environment, but are actually supported by fossil fuel industry interests, have launched disinformation campaigns.

In 2023, many Republican politicians and conservative groups immediately cast blame for whale deaths off the coast of New York and New Jersey on the offshore wind developers, but the evidence points instead to increased ship traffic collisions and entanglements with fishing gear.

Such disinformation can reduce public support and slow projects’ progress.

Just Keep Spinnin’

The Biden administration set a goal to install 30 gigawatts of offshore wind capacity by 2030, but recent estimates indicate that the actual number will be closer to half that.

Despite the challenges, developers have reason to move ahead.

The Inflation Reduction Act provides incentives, including federal tax credits for the development of clean energy projects and for developers that build port facilities in locations that previously relied on fossil fuel industries. Most coastal state governments are also facilitating projects by allowing for a price readjustment after environmental approvals have been given. They view offshore wind as an opportunity for economic growth.

These financial benefits can make building an offshore wind industry more attractive to companies that need market stability and a pipeline of projects to help lower costs—projects that can create jobs and boost economic growth and a cleaner environment.

[thepolymathexcuse]

Weeklies: In transition

Good evening, learners!

We started off this week with an interview in a position I applied to. While reviewing for the things that could help me during the interview, I learned about the effects of climate change with tuna fishing and strengthened my knowledge with the agency's structure and its projects. I was anxious even before the interview started because of the delay and the lack of time for preparation. After the interview proper, I was overwhelmed and delighted with how it went. Regardless of the result, my heart is at peace. The biggest point of learning with this activity came after the interview itself: feedback. Using my Obsidian app, I took notes of the things I could've done better and developed alternative answers to the interview questions I was asked as reference for future interviews.

We went through with our November planning and started conceptualizing our priority projects for this month as a result of our last week's review. 

The end of October also signaled the end of this mini-series called "today in photographs" in my personal Instagram page where I posted photographs of the highlights of my day-to-day activities. It was only visible to a select audience. It served two purposes: first, to document this particular phase in my life; and second, to bring an element of accountability with my progress on my healing journey. 

For November, I started with another daily challenge called 30 DoP, which is intended for all my followers to see. This is my 30 Days of Photography/Positivity challenge. Its goal will be: (1) to serve as an avenue with my practice of using the "pro" mode in my phone’s camera app; and (2) to share the overwhelming positivity that's been pouring out into my life to those who are in need of a little dose of optimism and hope.  

We also made progress with the YouTube course on Rhetoric and Composition: College Fundamentals by finishing Videos 19 to 24. I did a little bit of distillation of my notes under the third module of our Dr. Mendoza series. I procrastinated a little bit on my other areas of learning, because we didn't make any progress in the tipping elements class and the FAO e-learning course about other effective area-based conservation measures (OECMs) in marine fisheries. 

This procrastination, however, allowed us to continue learning in areas that aren't my priority.

While having breakfast last Tuesday (Oct. 29), I watched this YouTube video [1] by FEATR about the cleanest city in the Philippines: Bayawan City, Negros Oriental. Its local government unit should be the country's model in developing a solid waste management system that actually works. Excitedly, I shared this with some of my friends who might be interested in the video: to Ana, who was writing a policy brief about the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act as a requirement for one of her courses; and to Ruby and David, who both were able to visit Bayawan City two years ago.

While doing my business in the comfort room, I re-watched a TED Talk titled "How to escape education's death valley" by Sir Ken Robinson [2], and I was able to peer into the faults within the American education system and alternatives to those. Since my country's education system is largely influenced by systems of the West, I was able to relate the points made by Dr. Robinson in a local setting. This, in turn, deepened my understanding of alternative education systems and how a personalized learning curriculum could help in "escaping education's death valley." It provided me with more evidence that this journey of self-learning I'm taking is a great first step to doing that. This talk inspired me greatly that I was able to outline a talk idea about how being curious could lead us to find our purpose in life, and eventually satisfy the Japanese concept of ikigai. One thing led to another, and we were able to brain dump about a project that revolves around curiosity last Saturday.

On Wednesday, I watched yet another YouTube video from ParkNotes [3] and learned about the "Zibaldone" (pl. zibaldoni) which is an Italian version of the commonplace book that contains their favorite quotes and passages. I learned that they didn't just write their favorites in their own notebooks, but they also shared their "memorized" quotes by writing these in the zibaldoni of their acquaintances in the public setting.

I also started reading the book "Thinking Better: The Art of the Shortcut in Math and Life" by the Oxford mathematician and professor Marcos Du Sautoy. I reckon that finding "shortcuts" I can use in this journey of learning will be valuable in maximizing my time to make progress in my numerous areas of learning.

I also procrastinated by watching multiple videos from Scott Young's channel. One video [4] emphasized the twelve foundational habits we must build first in order to make way for greater productivity and overall, a more meaningful life. Connecting these habits into my already-existing knowledge of the SPIRE model to becoming "anti-fragile" by Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar [5], the life portfolio model introduced by the Harvard Business Review [6], and the 12 Rules of Creation by Dan Koe [7], allowed me to develop more of the system I'm currently building.

I also learned how to play Kagura in Mobile Legends! Unfortunately, it took up a lot of my time. 

On Saturday, I fell deeper into this procrastination state that I was doom scrolling for hours on end. I commented on a Reddit post that during moments of being stuck, small things are often the biggest victories. It was a reply from another comment which talked about how a simple accomplishment of making your bed early in the morning could snowball into a state of routines and productivity. With this, I realized that if I am having trouble with wanting to be productive and working on my projects–besides making the bed, which I already do every morning–the next simple thing I could do is to write in my commonplace notebook for fifteen to thirty minutes. I find that this helps because it resets my dopamine levels, especially when faced with the challenge brought by doom scrolling. Working in smaller chunks of time is already a proven technique in kick-starting productivity. 

Finally, this Sunday, I went to a night out with my friends Mayi, Neil, and Dean, and just caught up with the happenings of each other's lives. I learned a lot about the conversations we had until two in the morning and this time made me appreciate more of the current situation I am in.

This week has been a reduced version of our productive self last week, but I think we’re still doing okay compared to before. Like I always say, keep wandering and chase what excites you.

Footnotes:

[1] The Cleanest City in the Philippines (CAN THE REST OF THE COUNTRY DO IT?) | FEATR [Link]

[2] How to escape education's death valley | Sir Ken Robinson | TED [Link]

[3] Journal Like a Renaissance Philosopher | Park Notes [Link]

[4] Build the foundation first: An antidote to our brain’s tendency to overcomplicate simple things | Scott Young [Link]

[5] Don’t chase happiness. Become antifragile | Tal Ben-Shahar | Big Think [Link]

[6] Use Strategic Thinking to Create the Life You Want | Harvard Business Review [YouTube Link, Blog Link]

[7] Disappear And Come Back Unrecognizable (12 Rules To Change Your Life) | Dan Koe [Link]

[pscottm]

Who wants the U.S. Supreme Court to limit abortion pill access? Here’s the list. • West Virginia Watch

Students for Life of America — an organization that aims “to abolish abortion and provide policy, legal, and community support for women and their children” — wrote in its 32-page brief that the FDA has “failed to consider the impact Mifepristone could have on the environment, specifically on endangered species or listed habitats.”

Before the FDA approved the pharmaceutical, they claim, it should have consulted with the United States Fish and Wildlife Service as well as the National Marine Fisheries Service.

[rjzimmerman]

A ghost net, entangling 17 deceased sea turtles, was discovered days after a storm off the coast of Bahia, Brazil. Projeto Tamar Brazil/Marine Photobank/Courtesy of World Animal Protection

Excerpt from this press release from the Center for Biological Diversity:

Conservation groups sued several federal officials and departments today in the U.S. Court of International Trade over their failure to implement the import provisions of the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The provisions’ purpose is to protect marine mammals from bycatch in foreign fishing gear by holding countries exporting seafood to the United States to the same standards as U.S. fisheries.

The lawsuit was filed by the Animal Welfare Institute, the Center for Biological Diversity, and Natural Resources Defense Council against the U.S. Department of Commerce, National Marine Fisheries Service, U.S. Department of the Treasury, and U.S. Department of Homeland Security (and their respective leaders). The suit seeks a court order directing the government to implement the Act’s mandate to ban seafood imports from countries whose fisheries kill too many marine mammals.

“The U.S. government has violated the MMPA for far too long, causing significant harm to marine mammals worldwide,” said Kate O’Connell, senior policy consultant for the Animal Welfare Institute’s Marine Wildlife Program. “It is reprehensible that more than half a century after the MMPA was enacted, Americans are still buying seafood dinners with an invisible side of whale, dolphin, porpoise, or seal. Enough is enough.”

Approximately 70% to 85% of seafood consumed in the United States is imported from over 130 countries, including Canada, Indonesia, Ecuador and Mexico. The United States is the largest seafood importer in the world, with more than $21 billion worth of seafood products imported annually, accounting for more than 15% of the global value of all marine food products in trade.

Congress enacted the law in 1972 and included provisions about protecting marine mammals from bycatch and banning seafood imports from noncompliant fisheries. But NMFS did not adopt a rule to implement these provisions until 2016.

This import rule, as it is known, requires foreign fisheries to provide evidence that their bycatch prevention measures meet U.S. standards. The rule initially included a five-year exemption period to give countries sufficient time to assess marine mammal stocks, estimate bycatch, and develop rules to reduce bycatch. After that time, NMFS was supposed to determine whether countries’ fisheries were meeting U.S. standards and, if they were not, the U.S. government was supposed to ban imports from noncompliant fisheries.

In 2020 the agency extended implementation of the rule by one year because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Since then it has delayed implementation twice more, and the ban on harmful fishery imports is now on hold until Jan. 1, 2026.