![]() The Philippines is the one of the world’s largest ocean plastic polluters, and her team collects an average of 400kg of plastic every day from the water and beaches. Rose Anne Yocor, Toni’s niece, runs MCP’s coastal plastic-collecting programme. View image in fullscreen Building a bangka, the traditional boats used by fishers in Negros Oriental “People don’t care about the mangroves, they say their fishing nets get stuck in the mangroves, but preserving them will benefit the whole community living in this area, and all coastal areas,” says Evelyn Buca, who heads the volunteer project, as she looks out on to the mangroves she has been watching over since she was 11 years old. MCP also provides a large part of the funding needed to support the Bantay Dagat and other volunteer efforts, such as the team of 35 bantay women who safeguard the island’s mangrove forests, which are fundamental for flourishing ocean ecosystems as fish use them to spawn. Bamboo pathways have been built to encourage tourists to explore them close upĭata on the progress of the wildlife in these MPAs is collected by citizen scientists from the nonprofit organisation Marine Conservation Philippines (MCP), who come out to the MPAs daily to survey the corals, invertebrates and fish. View image in fullscreen A team of volunteers work to safeguard the mangrove forests. The wardens flash their lights at the intruders, chase them away on foot or by boat, and sometimes manage to apprehend and fine them according to the powers they’ve been given. I understand, I’m a fisherman too,” says Yocor. “It’s a very hard encounter, they are desperate. Today, MPA intruders are less frequent and less violent, and mostly local poachers who are trying to sneak in for a large catch of fish just when their family has nothing to eat or a big debt to pay off. ![]() He says he would routinely take a gun to his Bantay Dagat night shifts in case tensions rose and encounters got “nasty”. When Yocor started the patrol team, many family members and neighbours saw him as a traitor who’d turned his back on the town’s food security needs. ![]() Even authorities turned a blind eye to any wrongdoing because the fishers were often “their compadres”, says Yocor. View image in fullscreen Citizen scientists from Marine Conservation Philippines survey a marine protected area to check on the progress of corals, invertebrates and fishĪnd getting local communities on board with the sanctuaries hasn’t been easy, with MPA boundaries frequently being vandalised or ignored.
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