The more, but not the merrier, as China launches research project to tackle jellyfish boom
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Finding yourself standing in awe in front of semi-transparent jellyfish in an aquarium? But too many jellyfish have become a headache for offshore fishing, so China has launched a million-dollar research project Saturday in eastern China's coastal City Qingdao. Thirty Chinese scientists will participate in the five-year project to look into the biological and ecological characters of jellyfish, the causes of the jellyfish population boom, its impact and countermeasures to bring the population under control, said Sun Song with the Chinese Academy of Sciences and lead scientist of the project. The project, with a fund of 28 million yuan (4.25 million U.S.dollars) from the Ministry of Science and Technology, will focus on those areas prone to jellyfish outbreaks in the East China Sea and the Yellow Sea, said Sun. The scientists from Xiamen University, Ocean University of China, Tianjin University of Science and Technology and two oceanography institutes will carry out field investigations and experiments in laboratories, large aquariums and jellyfish farms. The jellyfish boom, which happened every 40 years in the past, has occurred almost every year in the last decade, incurring huge damage to fisheries and tourism, said Sun. With over 1,400 species, jellyfish can be as small as a few centimeters to several meters, and a large jellyfish can weigh 200 kilograms. As jellyfish share the same food with many fish, commercial fishing takes a huge decline when the jellyfish population boom happens, Sun said. Sun gave an example. The catch in the famous fishing grounds near Benguela City of southern Africa's Angola has dropped from 17 million tonnes per year in 1980s to 1 million tonnes in 2009 due to the increase of jellyfish. The East China Sea and Yellow Sea have also been severely hit by jellyfish outbreaks. A survey carried out by the Chinese Academy of Fishery Sciences in 2009 shows that 95 percent of the catch in the East China Sea are jellyfish. "Except for sea blubber, other jellyfish species are totally useless to humans," said Liu Ruiyu, an academician with the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The jellyfish boom also affected coastal tourism around the world, as they sting 150 million people annually, with 100 death, Sun cited news reports as saying. Meanwhile, the increase of jellyfish also forced some offshore power plants and desalination plants to shut down. "These plants draw sea water as cooling water for their facilities, but with large amount of jellyfish in the area, the pipelines could be blocked." Sun said. The jellyfish boom has drawn attention around the world and three international conferences have been held, including one in America in 2001, one in Australia in 2007 and the other in Argentina in 2010, to find the causes of this disaster and develop counter-measures. Causes of the outbreak have yet to be pinpointed, with many blaming over-fishing, global warming, and other causes. "The jellyfish boom has already become a severe marine crisis for humans, and we need to tackle it starting with this project," Sun added. |
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