Yury Kulikov, Director of Events at the Vancouver Surfrider Foundation is a structural engineer who came to Montreal from the Russian Baltic region whence he developed his love for the sea. In earlier ages there was no realization that deeds had consequences, in this case, dumping waste, willy nilly, into oceans. We now know our planet depends on the ocean climate as evidenced by the Arctic melt which has already led to extinction of many marine species in recent times. This planet also depends on the 60% of the total Oxygen the oceans generate that is necessary for life. Yury was fascinated by the connection between oceans and the planet which led to his desire to clear the waste he saw on beaches, his contribution of maintaining the health of our planet. Thus his membership 3 years ago in the Surfriders Foundation, whose mission is to clear seas and beaches of garbage, another serious factor in maintaining the health of our planet.
Surfriders, run entirely by volunteers, with no outside funding, was started in California in 1984 by a group of people realizing the danger posed by garbage on beaches, not just an eyesore but a hazard. There are now Surfrider chapters across the world, 90 in the USA. The Vancouver Chapter was created in 2005 and its members, from diverse occupations, share their deep concern in preserving the health of our planet. Their meetings are held on beaches, their meeting room. They held 12 events in 2016, in one of which members of our club cooperated, by clearing garbage off our beaches, the contents then being collated into categories. Cigarette butts remain among the foremost ‘sinners’ as the paper is toxic and particularly harmful to birds. Other harmful objects such as plastic doggie bags and plastics of all sorts find their way into the collection buckets. It has also been found that some of the debris emanates far from our beaches. The Vancouver chapter is now cooperating with clearing beaches beyond the city as well as beaches on Vancouver Island. One of these is Radar Beach, not easily accessible by land. A circle filmed by air showed the area and site where a boat could moor at the path leading to the site of the cleanup.
Yury also mentioned the progress that has been made on Microbeads, small beads which pass through filtration causing great harm to fish and other wildlife who ingest them, thereby also entering our food chain. Microbeads are found in various products including some toothpastes. It is hoped that a Bill will be passed soon to ban these products in BC.
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