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Can we solve the problems facing our oceans today?
Yes. That's the message behind Saving the Ocean, a new series hosted by renowned marine biologist and best-selling author Carl Safina.
"There's a lot to be excited and hopeful about in conservation today," says Safina, founder of the Blue Ocean Institute and author of the critically acclaimed The View from Lazy Point and the upcoming A Sea in Flames, his account of the 2010 Gulf oil blowout. "Saving the Ocean brings attention to those places where things are going right—and what we can learn from them."
Though oceans cover two-thirds of the planet, give us half our oxygen, and help feed us, most Americans don't know what we can do to protect them. Saving the Ocean helps fill that gap by spotlighting marine conservation success stories around the world. The series combines investigative reporting with the best of nature, travel, and adventure television—including original, high-definition underwater photography—to bring advances in marine science and conservation to a broad audience.
"We want viewers to see that all is not lost with the ocean environment, and by extension the global environment," says series producer John Angier, who also was executive producer of the long-running PBS series Scientific American Frontiers. "Things can change and we can be smart with our world."
Shark Reef
"Shark Reef," the first of two half-hour episodes, profiles innovative efforts to protect sharks from the devastating effects of the global shark fin trade. Safina travels to Glover's Reef Marine Reserve in Belize, where targeted regulations on fishing are helping sharks thrive. And he's encouraged by the early success of a grassroots campaign in Hong Kong that asks people to pledge not to eat shark fin soup.
The Sacred Island
"The Sacred Island" takes viewers to Zanzibar, off the East African coast, where local villagers fought a resort development in their pristine reefs and lagoons through a combination of activism, education, and regulation. Safina meets local fishermen practicing low-impact fishing techniques inspired by Islamic principles and the influential imams whose focus on Koranic messages of environmental stewardship could be a key to ocean conservation throughout the Muslim world.
Future episodes of Saving the Ocean will look at how a return to earlier, less mechanized American fishing methods could revive the struggling New England cod fishery; how farms that don't destroy coastal mangroves and trawls that don't kill sea turtles might drive a shrimping revolution; and how new solutions could finally realize the 20-year-old promise of "dolphin-safe" tuna.
Four years ago, Popular Science magazine gave "Oceanographer" the number-two spot on its list of the "10 Worst Jobs in Science," saying, "Nothing but bad news, day in and day out."
Saving the Ocean shows how wrong they were.
"We know how to solve most of the problems facing our oceans," says Safina. "Saving the Ocean will help viewers understand what those problems are and get them inspired about what we can do moving forward."
At the Blue Ocean Institute, explore advocacy and education programs, read original essays, and learn what you can do to protect the ocean.
Not sure what seafood is environmentally sustainable? Get help from the Blue Ocean Institute's seafood guide.
Visit Chedd-Angier to find out what inspired Saving the Ocean, and see on-location photos from Zanzibar and Belize.
With the Pemba Foundation, Saving the Ocean host Carl Safina and producer John Angier are working to develop human potential on the East African island of Pemba.
See what’s being done to preserve one of the world’s most spectacular coral atolls at Glover's Reef Marine Reserve.
At Shark Savers, watch videos encouraging people to stop eating shark fin soup, the number-one threat to the world’s shark populations.
