Pew Oceans Report
by Chelsea Murphy
“America’s oceans are in crisis and the stakes could not be higher.”
Such are the opening words of the Pew Oceans Commission’s long anticipated report, America’s Living Oceans: Charting a Course for Sea Change, which was released this past June.
 The “Pew Oceans Report”, as its become known, is the published summary of findings of the Pew Oceans Committee; who were commissioned in 2000 by President Clinton. Chaired by the Clinton Chief of Staff Leon Panetta, the 18-member committee includes such notable figures as David Rockefeller, Jr., the Honorable George Pataki, Governor of New York, and Vice Admiral Roger Ruffe, Jr. U.S. Coast Guard (Ret.), president and CEO of The Ocean Conservancy. The committee also included various representatives from the American Sport Fishing Association, North Pacific Fishery Management Council, Natural Resources Defense Council, Scripps Institute of Oceanography and others. The committee compiled its findings into one of the most comprehensive report on the health of our world’s oceans and coastal areas ever published.
According to the report, “Pollution and sprawl threaten ocean-related tourism and recreation, far and away the largest component of the coastal economy. But there are more than jobs at stake. All Americans depend on the oceans and affect the oceans, regardless of where they live.”
The Pew Oceans Report identifies several issues that are threatening the health of our nation’s oceans and coastlines, including point and non-point source pollution, invasive species, coastal development, over-fishing and bycatch, habitat alteration and climate change. The report also makes several recommendations in working to counter the increasing threats, including developing a new national ocean policy, establishing a permanent national oceans council, and establishing a national system of marine reserves.
“At least it shows that we are on the right track in terms of addressing the most urgent issues,” says Edward Mazzarella, National Director of Chapters for the Surfrider Foundation. “Nearly all of our chapters are utilizing the Blue Water Task Force program to help identify and address sources of urban runoff and other types non-point source pollution. Other chapters are using the framework of our Special Places campaign to help establish marine protected areas to protect ocean and coastal ecosystems.”
Surprisingly, the findings from the Pew Ocean Report are not entirely new.
“Much of what we see in the Pew Oceans Report was originally documented in the Stratton Commission Report back in 1969,” says Mazzarella. “Hopefully, our lawmakers will act upon the recommendations from the Pew Commission’s report a bit more aggressively than they did from the Stratton report. I don’t think our oceans, waves and beaches can stand another 30 years of abuse.”
For more information on the Pew Ocean Commission’s report America’s Living Ocean; Charting a Course for Sea Change, visit their website at http://www.pewoceans.org.
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