In 21 days, around a hundred people removed around 60 tonnes of waste from an important sea turtles’ nesting area on an island in Cape Verde.
Biosfera employees, volunteers and the organisation’s boat crew undertook a mega clean-up campaign around the island of Santa Luzia, primarily along Achados beach, between May 24 and June 13, 2024,
In addition, Biosfera’s team continued its Waste Characterisation Study at 10 sampling sites on the island, begun in 2021, in order to have reliable results on the quantities of rubbish that reach the beach every year. This year, Biosfera calculated that 30 tonnes of the waste corresponded to nets and ropes from the fishing industry and 13 tonnes were from plastic waste.
Over the 21 days, the group was able to work on around 30 hectares of beach, along 3.5 kilometres of coastline.
Located in the northern part of the Cabo Verde archipelago, the island is part of an extraordinary Nature Reserve with a great wealth of flora and fauna. Santa Luzia, which has been uninhabited since the 1960s, is home to several endemic species and a highly important nesting site for the sea turtle species Caretta caretta.
However, due to Cabo Verde’s geographical location in the centre of the North Atlantic Gyre (a place in the ocean where the sea currents are circular and there is a greater accumulation of waste) Santa Luzia is also prone to the continuous accumulation of waste from the ocean.
In fact, Santa Luzia has received international attention because of the shear amount of waste that gathers on its shores.
As part of the study, the beach iss divided into 10x10m or 10x20m sites – depending on whether they are located in the tidal zone, intermediate zone or dune zone. All the waste is collected and then sorted, counted and weighed by category (e.g. nets and ropes, plastic, glass, metal, etc.).
“Despite the difficult conditions on the island, the arrival of the first turtles on the beach makes all the effort worthwhile,” says Nadina Rodrigues, director of Biosfera. “We would like to thank all the volunteers who, once again, joined us in this important action in favour of sea turtle conservation,”