Beneath the pristine waters off Thailand’s Phuket island, an environmental threat looms large as divers work to disentangle abandoned fishing gear from coral which have trapped unsuspecting fish inside. An estimated 1 million tons of ghost gear are lost in the ocean each year, according to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). While there are several scuba diving groups working to remove ghost gear from reefs through clean-up missions, there is no system put in place to track the collection of the plastic litter, according to Salisa Traipipitsiriwat, Senior Campaigner and Southeast Asian Plastic Manager from the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF). The non-governmental organization is helping to coordinate lessons that teach recreational divers – a fast-growing scuba hobby group which has over 80,000 certified divers – how to use scientific tools to help marine scientists address plastic pollution.

Join ANC PRESTIGE to get access to perks:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvi6hEzLM-Z_unKPSuuzKvg/join

Subscribe to the ANC YouTube channel!
https://www.youtube.com/user/ANCalerts

Visit our website at https://news.abs-cbn.com/anc
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ancalerts
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ancalerts

Take the opportunity to connect and share this video with your friends and family if you find it useful.