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 On 15th March over 75 people gathered at Rhyl SeaQuarium to hear about the serious issues facing our Seas and to find out more about the Marine Conservation Society’s latest campaign to protect them.
The morning was a great success and with help from the Anglesey SeaZoo, the SeaQuarium welcomed guests from across North Wales and from a wide range of backgrounds, industries and public bodies. The morning generated a lot of interest from local politicians with representatives present from Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democrat Welsh Assembly Government were present to hear the views of local people from fishermen to university students.
Opening the proceedings at the morning was Local Labour MP, Chris Ruane who highlighted some of his owns concerns for our seas and some of the questions he has raised him parliament relating to our local marine environment.
Marine Conservation Society Biodiversity Officer, Jean-Luc Solandt then spoke about the success of marine protected areas around the world, and introduced the Your Seas Your Voice campaign website to provide a voice to the public to protect ours seas, with the Welsh perspective covered by the MCS Welsh officer, Gill Bell.
 The planned development of Marine Conservation zones in the Irish Sea were then introduced by Emily Hardman from the Irish Seas Conservation Zones project. Rachel Ball of the National Museum in Liverpool then highlighted why Marine Protected areas are essential for certain species of fish, in particular skates and rays which have suffered massive declines in the Irish Seas in recent decades.
The morning was finished off nicely with a talk from guest speaker, Iolo Williams. Iolo is a popular Welsh natural history presenter and has filmed extensively throughout Wales both for S4C and the BBC. He explained how, during the filming of his latest series, his eyes had been opened to the wealth of beautiful marine life off the shores of Wales. Having seen our beautiful underwater world first hand, Iolo knows just how much we have to protect, “'We have used the sea as a dumping ground for centuries but now, it is coming back to haunt us. We must all act quickly to safeguard the fantastic variety of wildlife that lives beneath the waves and the conference at Rhyl shows that people do care”.
Displays manager Paul Tyson said “I’m over the moon at how successful the morning has been. The staff at the aquarium have worked rally hard to ensure the day was a success and I’m so pleased that we have helped to raise the profile of this campaign for what is an issue of real importance and urgency”
The Your Seas Your Voice campaign is your way of voicing your concern for our seas and registering your vote on what areas of the country you would like to see protected. Jean-Luc of the Marine conservation society explained “The impressive turnout at Rhyl demonstrates how much the seas and their ability to provide jobs and livelihoods, whilst also conserving wildlife, is of utmost importance to the people of north Wales” to register your vote or find out more about the campaign is very simple, just go on line at www.yourseasyourvoice.com. |
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