The Environmental Justice Foundation is teaming up with local villagers throughout Thailand to recycle and reuse old discarded fishing nets to ease pollution in the Gulf of Thailand and the Andaman Sea.
According to the EJF, 640,000 tons of discarded nets are left in the ocean every year where they become hazards for wildlife of all shapes and sizes from whales and dolphins to coral reefs.
“Local coastal communities, which are already bearing the brunt of illegal fishing, are having their income further threatened by such losses,” the EJF said in a statement.
In Thailand the EJF are teaming up with a design firm, Qualy, and the Department of Fisheries to work with local communities to collect trash nets and use them to create new items.
Among the items that will be created by Qualy are face shields and other Covid-19 prevention tools.
“What makes this project so unique and potentially transformative is the fact that it’s local communities who are involved from the very start; collecting the nets, separating the waste and receiving the financial benefits from sales,” said Dominic Thomson, the Deputy Director and Project Manager for EJF in Southeast Asia.
“We want it to be as simple, impactful and scaleable as possible,” he told Thai Enquirer.
