SDG 14 - Life below water
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), also known as the Global Goals were adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015 as a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity by 2030. It is unanimously adopted by 193 countries. There are 17 SDGs in total which are integrated — that is, they recognise that action in one area will affect outcomes in others, and that development must balance social, economic and environmental sustainability.
This blog will focus on goal number 14 — Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development. This SDG’s aim is to protect and manage the marine and coastal ecosystems from pollution keeping sustainability as the key principle. It also plans to address the impacts of ocean acidification. It is estimated that over 5 trillion pieces of plastic are littered across all the major ocean basins. Almost 80% of all marine debris is composed of plastic items, and nearly 8 million tons of plastic enter various water bodies every year, causing phenomena such as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
Being non-biodegradable, plastic has the ability to last in the environment for millions of years, and this causes oceans to slowly accumulate plastic waste, directly affecting marine species who end up ingesting or entangling with plastic, causing needless deaths via starvation and suffocation. Carcinogenic chemicals used in the production of plastic also make their way up the food chain and end up negatively affecting humans when consuming seafood.
The source of this problem is mainly on account of inefficient and inadequate waste management on land and water bodies like rivers, lakes and oceans. Hence, it requires a multi-pronged approach to make the oceans healthy, focussing on innovation, and change. In this effort, several companies and governments have taken multiple initiatives. Some of these initiatives have been described below.
SDG 14 and the Indian government
The Indian government is also doing quite a bit to achieve this sustainable development goal. As per their voluntary national review report released by Niti Aayog, India is working on a couple of major initiatives to do its bit in achieving this particular SDG, namely:
1. Mangroves & Coral Reefs
As compared to the last assessment, the government has enabled an increase of 112 square km of mangrove coverage. The Integrated Coastal Zone Management project has ensured a plantation of 15,000 ha of mangroves in Gujarat alone. India has also identified 4 coral reefs that the government believes need intensive conservation and management.
2. Sustainability of Fisheries
India has over 14.5 million people dependent on fishing as their profession, and to ensure their livelihood coexists with a sustainable ecosystem, there has been a push on sustainable fishing practices to prevent adverse effects on endangered marine species.
3. Protection of coastal ecosystems
There has been an ocean monitoring system set up by the government in 2015 that monitors water pollution levels and water quality and provides data for a better understanding of the coastal processes. The national policy on marine fisheries was also formed in 2017, focusing on sustainable development, intergenerational equity, a precautionary approach among other goals.
4. Holistic development of coastal areas
The government also introduced the ambitious Sagarmala project that intends to develop and enhance port connectivity, infrastructure and development, with a focus on waterways to increase coastal tourism to enable access to better livelihood opportunities.
From the Indian context, the focus is on preserving and maintaining the existing resources, focusing on coral reefs, and coastal ecosystems. However, the point being missed here is the specific focus on certain marine life systems, apart from the reefs. Here, overfishing will take precedence, followed by other environmental issues like reduction in oxygen levels in the oceans. There is not enough focus on identifying and protecting endangered species and ensuring that the fishing industry functions sustainably by offering short-term incentives and long-term penalties.
SDG 14 and companies
Maersk
Maersk has contributed around USD 2 million in vessel services and equipment to launch a full-scale ocean plastic clean-up system. It has deployed a 600m long floating buoy system with a display to collect plastic waste for recycling. It was installed by a supply service vessel located 1,200 nautical miles off the coast of San Francisco. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is estimated to contain around 1.8 trillion pieces of plastic and spans across an area twice of Texas. This project has helped clear around 2,000 kgs of plastic and terabytes of data to develop further upgrades and redeployment.
Dell
In the financial year 2017–18, Dell pioneered the usage of ocean-bound plastics by collecting sizeable plastics from waterways, beaches, and coastal areas and using them in the packaging of their flagship products. They began with shipping their XPS 13 2-in-1 using the packaging from ocean-bound plastics and committed to increase the annual usage by ten times by 2025 and also open-source their supply chain to encourage other companies in using ocean plastics. In FY18, Dell also tied up with Lonely Whale for setting up a cross-industry consortium of global companies that have common goals in working towards scaling the usage of ocean-bound plastics. They also exceeded their initial 2020 goal of incorporating 50 million pounds of recycled-content plastic and other sustainable materials in their operations and have revised their goals to 100 million pounds.
The Adidas Story
Adidas is ranked very high as per the Fashion Transparency Index 2019 and has focused on the elimination of the use of additional plastic to create a significant impact. Adidas emerged as one of the major partners while working with “Parley for the Oceans”, an environmental organization working to reduce the usage of plastic and create awareness regarding the same. The focus is on implementing AIR strategy (A — avoid plastic use, I — intercept plastic from entering oceans, R — redesign existing products). Parley for the Oceans intercepts the plastic from reaching oceans, and the processed waste is converted into yarn used in shoe manufacturing. In 2015, 2810 tons of plastic waste was stopped from reaching oceans. [1] In 2018, Adidas produced 5 million pairs of shoes (like UltraBoost Parley) from upcycled marine plastic waste, and the target for 2019 is 11 million pairs. Adidas plans to replace virgin polyester with 100% recycled one by 2024 to continue the sustainability measures in the future.
The annual ‘Run for the Oceans’ event is conducted to raise awareness among almost a million runners, and an amount of 1 million dollars was collected that can help in educating people about plastic hazards and impact on the oceans. The 2019 event to be conducted in Mumbai to raise awareness in India.
Adidas was also a founding member of the ‘Better Cotton Initiative’, as part of which, 68% cotton sourced globally was better cotton in 2016. In April 2016, the company also eliminated the use of plastic bags from retail stores and offices, a move that will eliminate 70 million shopping bags every year.
Adidas also focuses on compensating for the plastic usage, which is unavoidable in today’s age by supporting sustainable fashion platforms like ‘Fashion for Good’. It contributed 1.5 million euros in a direct attempt to compensate for its adverse environmental impact due to plastic usage in packaging.
Unilever
Unilever, through the Unilever Sustainable Living Plan (USLP), is aiming to create a more circular plastic economy, where they gradually eliminate the “take-make-dispose” model and aim to not only reduce plastic usage in their products but ensure that whatever plastic packaging is being used can be reused and/or recycled.
Their goal is to have 100% of the packaging being used to be reusable or recyclable by 2025 and to have 25% of their packaging by composed of recyclable plastics by the same time. To that end, Unilever has reduced the amount of plastic used in packaging by one-third since 2010, which has been done by using more advanced polymers and optimizing package designs.
As such, HUL was able to reduce plastic waste generated by nearly 2800 tons in 2018. HUL has also worked on bringing in refillable SKUs into the market, encouraging consumers to eliminate the disposal of primary packs and reduce plastic waste. It has also started using recyclable PET in blister packs for various personal care brands, thus encouraging on building a circular economy for plastics in India.
Recommendations and Analysis
Rivers are the primary source of plastic waste into the oceans. Over 1000 rivers are accountable for almost 80% of the global annual emissions of approximately 0.8–2.7 million metric tons per year, among which the rural-urban are the most polluting. Working together with government leaders, private players and the scientific community can directly target rivers in order to create a direct impact on ocean pollution. India being house to some of the most polluted rivers of the world, there is a vast scope to work in that particular direction.
The OceanCleanup is one of the startups that is working on Interceptors that could be installed in the rivers to collect the emissions before they could enter oceans after which it becomes difficult to track them. Private players and government can collaborate with companies like these as a part of their sustainability initiatives to reduce and clean up the existing plastic waste from water bodies.
The govt of India should organize an Ocean conference in India and all the corporations utilising oceanic resources like Coal, Petroleum, Pharma, and fisheries should make feasible quantifiable and achievable commitments and adhere to them strictly like treating the waste before discharging into the oceans to reduce acidification. The food processing companies should focus on sustainable fishing methods and implement technological advancements to avoid overexploitation of marine life. Also, strict regulations should be put in place to avoid littering of plastic wastes into the water bodies which cause a lot of damage to marine life.
The govt should dedicate a Research and development team with scientists and climate change experts and formulate long term solutions to reduce the damage to the oceans.
The Government Aspect
India can focus on various other issues that directly impact life underwater, especially in terms of ocean life. We are one of the largest perpetrators of over-fishing, and the second-largest shark hunters, right after Indonesia.
We have also caused the loss of much-beloved Bengali delicacy, the hilsa fish, populations of which have been dwindling due to the overfishing. While Bangladesh has set up sanctuaries for hilsa and slowly is lifting the ban on hilsa exports, India lags behind in this aspect.
India needs to put in its efforts in banning shark fishing for a while and find a sustainable route to ensure that the dependent fishermen and their families do not suffer. This can come by offering the people short term penalties to stop fishing and give them long term solutions to switch to other fishes, or maybe help them do it sustainably. This also needs to happen across other species that have been overfished. We need to research more and identify the various life-forms in and around our waters and check for various endangered species, document them, and actively work on their preservation. We already know that Ganges and the Pondicherry sharks, the narrow snout sawfish and the knife tooth sawfish are critically endangered according to the IUCN red list. There could be other species that are close to facing extinction.
Another pressing issue that we are facing is the dwindling oxygen levels in Indian waters, especially in the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian sea. Noctiluca scintillans, a single-celled dinoflallegate, often seen in winter and in areas with low oxygen levels, Climate change and industrial pollution has increased such dead zones and the overall levels of oxygen have dropped by almost an astounding 2 percent. Various reasons have caused this issue including sewer discharge, agro-chemical dumping, glacial melting, and this has led to a drastic drop in the oxygen available for the marine life to live, causing deaths due to suffocation.
The government needs to focus on sewage treatment plants in the coastal cities, that dump much of its sewage into the sea. India also needs to work on fertilizer application and subsequent discharge and waste management. Monitoring oxygen levels in real-time will help in revealing low-oxygen levels and areas that are susceptible to becoming dead zones.
The government needs to focus on sewage treatment plants in the coastal cities, that dump much of its sewage into the sea. India also needs to work on fertilizer application and subsequent discharge and waste management. Monitoring oxygen levels in real-time will help in revealing low-oxygen levels and areas that are susceptible to becoming dead zones.
References
Authors
Amit Kumar Garg - B19065
Harshit Jain - B19079
Jubin Sharma - B19081
M Sai Phanindra - B19086
Padmanabh Pandit - B19091
Group 5, Section B, PGDM (BM), 2019-21 Batch
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