NOWPAP Holds Activities on Oil Spill Response and Coastal Clean ups

 

Oil spill response exercise
The NOWPAP DELTA Joint Oil Spill Response Exercise was conducted on 21 October 2014 near Vladivostok, Russia.  This joint exercise brought together 17 ships and 1 helicopter including one ship from the Japan Coast Guard to test rescues of crew members, firefighting and response to oil spills.  RO Korea dispatched observers to the exercise which was completed successfully.  Such full-scale exercises have been organized five times in NOWPAP member states. The Regional Oil and HNS Spill Contingency Plan were adopted in 2004.
ICC campaign and workshop
The 2014 NOWPAP International Coastal Cleanup (ICC) was organized in Boryeong, Republic of Korea on 25-26 September 2014. The annual event comprised a beach cleanup campaign and a workshop on marine litter management.  NOWPAP marine litter focal points,  representatives of national and local governments in the NOWPAP member states (China, Korea, Japan and Russia), NOWPAP partners of GPA, PEMSEA and GESAMP, universities, academic institutes and environmental NGOs participated in the event.
Opened by the Minister of the Oceans and Fisheries of Korea (MOF), the beach clean up also brought several hundreds of local school kids and citizens who joined NOWPAP participants to collect and classify the marine litter on the beach and record in the ICC data cards.
The marine litter workshop was opened by the Deputy Minister of MOF and attended by about 50 participants, featuring management efforts by central and local governments, best practices in dealing with sea-based marine litter and international cooperation.
During the 2014 NOWPAP ICC, a brief working meeting was organized in which NOWPAP marine litter focal points and representatives of NOWPAP regional activities centers reviewed the progress made on marine litter management by NOWPAP members and shared information regarding the implementation of the NOWPAP Regional Action Plan on Marine Litter for 2014-2015.
NOWPAP RCU staff joins local beach cleanup efforts
Staff members of NOWPAP RCU in Toyama joined school kids, university students and local citizens in beach cleanup on 17 September 2014.  This event was organized by the Northwest Pacific Region Environmental Cooperation Centre (NPEC) as part of their marine litter monitoring programme which has been implemented for several years by Japan, China, RO Korea and Russia.  The marine litter collected on the beach was sorted and recorded.  The most predominant litter was plastic (more than 80%), followed by polystyrene and then metal.