If you see a plastic from the boat pick it up and bring it ashore. It is the new word of mouth of Italian fishermen. They feel part of a circular economy industrial project even if they are not yet sure that everything will go as they hoped. They are mobilized, that's for sure, after the launch of the bill on the recovery of plastic at sea. It took the government some time to approve a text which, in addition to the environmental aspects, intends to protect the local fishing chain. A vital sector of the economy, to which Confindustria is dedicating a workshop on 17 May in Rome as part of EXCO2019 (the International Fair for Sustainable Development Cooperation).
The economic value of Italian fishing is close to 62 million euros e floating plastic in the Mediterranean has now reached 90 tons. Very high figures in the hands of the Ministry of the Environment which now has the task of completing the process. The provision must become law as soon as possible in order not to frustrate the efforts made so far. Operators expect the text to be published in the Official Gazette by the end of the summer. Discussion in the Chamber of Deputies is expected in June. For Minister Costa and the entire government, it is mandatory to move from statements to facts. Launching a signal of attention to those who live in the sea and who have so far, in terms of recovering plastics at sea, have taken a big risk. Fishermen will be able to bring ashore the plastic found in the nets or sighted and collected, without any sanctions and completely changing the approach. They will no longer look the other way when they spot things harmful to water, fearing having to burden their micro-companies with improper costs.
It is an important change of pace, because until yesterday the fishing boats were forced to throw everything they found back into the sea. The fish on the ground and the bottles in the water. A paradox for a country surrounded by 2/3 of the sea due to a series of absurd rules. If the boats had brought what was found to the docks of the ports, the crew would have been reported for illegal transport of waste. Fishermen considered producers of waste and obliged to bear the costs of disposal. With the new text of the law, however, plastic can be brought to the ground, now classified as waste on a par with those produced by ships. Ports will have to equip themselves with modern ecological islands for which a new plant engineering market is opening up on the quay.
The era of taking responsibility away from cleaning up the waters ends in which thousands of people work every day on hundreds of boats. And it is the fishermen themselves who recall that a plastic bag sighted remains in the sea for 20 years. Scavengers of the sea were then defined as those who will do their ecological duty in the hope of also obtaining rewards. And it was about time they were there, to encourage a job green and radically change the system.
First of all, the Authority for energy, networks and the environment (Arera) will have to establish the criteria for a component of the tariff for the management costs of fished waste. Then an interministerial decree will indicate i economic rewards for shipowners and fishermen who clean up the waters. The latter indication has already arrived from the EU and which Italy has disregarded.
The economic aspects of the principles of sustainable fishing are also underlined by the trade associations. They recall that the entire fish supply chain "will be adequately recognizable and recognized" in a Mediterranean, semi-enclosed sea where 250 billion plastic fragments have been recorded (7% of global microplastics) with 70 species of fish infected with plastic indigestion. A stimulus to do even better and more economically effective has arrived in recent days from the Pd MEP, Simona Bonafè, who asked the Italian government to also implement the European directive on the ban on the use of disposable plastic. Another piece to add to a strategy of tprotection and conservation of marine waters. The economic advantages are undoubted to limit excesses in activities related to the sea. But as fishermen have been doing in recent weeks, it is enough just to wait for the discussion in Parliament and the definitive passing of the law.
