A U.S. State Department conference on the oceans raised an impressive $800 million for marine conservation this week. The conference was also notable for the announcement by President Obama of an intent to significantly expand the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument.
Funds were raised both from government and private sources. In addition to the $800 million haul, Norway pledged $1 billion in climate change mitigation and adaptation.
Actor, Leonardo DiCaprio, who also spoke at the conference pledged $7 million over two years through his Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation.
“Since my very first dive in the Great Barrier Reef in Australia 20 years ago, to the dive I got to do in the very same location just two years ago, I’ve witnessed environmental devastation first-hand. What once had looked like an endless underwater utopia is now riddled with bleached coral reefs and massive dead zones,” he said.
Soft coral in Komodo National Park in Indonesia. Photo by: Nick Hobgood/Creative Commons 3.0.
DiCaprio, who once mulled a career as a marine biologist, has long been a supporter of conservation and environmental issues. In 2010, he gave $1 million for tiger conservation and earlier this year pledged $1 million for elephants. Last year, the five time Academy Award nominee, raised nearly $40 million for conservation efforts through a major art auction.
In his speech, DiCaprio pointed to overfishing and destructive fishing practices—like bottom-trawling—as imperiling innumerable marine species.
“We have systematically devastated our global fisheries with destructive practices like bottom-trawling where huge nets drag across the bottoms of the oceans for miles, literally scraping up everything in their path, permanently destroying abundant underwater forests teeming with every imaginable form of wildlife.”
Scientists have warned that mass extinction could hit the world’s oceans due to a number of worsening threats, including global warming, ocean acidification, pollution, and overfishing.
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