The influence of man’s activities on the Earth, more precisely on its biosphere, is such that, without any doubt, we can say that we live on a planet whose ecosystems are dominated by people. Ecosystems that are not under some form of anthropogenic influence no longer exist, and the world’s seas are not only an exception but are particularly vulnerable as they are often treated as reservoirs of inexhaustible stocks.
For this reason, even in the last century, it has become clear that the sea, including the estuaries, the seaside, the coastal waters, and the open ocean, loses biodiversity at great speed and shows changes in the functioning of the ecosystem.
There are numerous anthropogenic threats to marine biodiversity that appear at different time and space levels, from local short-term pollution to the long-term regional impact of fishing, eutrophication, climate change, introduced species, and other disorders.
Unlike land ecosystems, where habitat loss is the root cause of population decline and species erosion, overexploitation is recognized as the major threat to marine biodiversity to such an extent that we can conclude that man, as the predominant marine predator, systematically devours marine organisms to extinction.
Some of the possible consequences of anthropogenic pressures on the marine environment are:
- economic Losses Through Unemployment and Reduced Productivity
- drastically reducing the number of edible marine organisms
- dying of species that are a potential source of new drugs
- reduced ability of the ecosystem to respond to changes, both natural and anthropogenic
- accelerating Global Climate Change
- social and political instability.
The results of such behavior have broad social, economic, and biological consequences that go beyond national and regional borders and can only be successfully solved by cooperation at the international level and within global frameworks. However, it should be borne in mind at the same time that global initiatives cannot substitute for local conservation efforts, national regulation, and regional cooperation in the protection of the sea.
Sunce thinks that man has to use the resources and opportunities offered by the marine environment while simultaneously protecting ecological processes and systems. It is the foundation of sustainable development and can only be achieved by adopting appropriate management methods. Our efforts are therefore aimed at establishing and implementing effective management plans for marine protected areas and areas of the Natura 2000 network at sea, developing and enhancing the professional capacity of employees in the Marine Sector in Croatia and the region, conducting mapping and tracking the status of marine species and habitats, lobbying for better legal measures for the protection of the sea and managing the resources of the sea, as well as educating and informing the public about processes related to the preservation of the marine environment.
Successful and sustainable management of the world’s seas requires a broad, transdisciplinary approach that can integrate natural and social sciences with the process of adopting legal regulations and must be based on a solid scientific basis.