Impact Of Oceans On The Ocean

Oceanic Impact For as far back as humankind can remember, Oceans have been a major part of our livelihood. Oceans cover nearly 71% of the Earth’s surface along with marginal seas, and land comprises the other 29%. Humans have always been fascinated with Oceans for their beauty, size, and great uncertainty. To date, it is believed that only 9% of all oceanic life forms have been discovered, which leaves millions of unidentified plants and sea life still out there. Aside from the sheer admiration, humans have figured out just how valuable the Ocean is to our well-being and survival. Humans rely on the Ocean for transportation of international goods and services, food like fish and shellfish, mining minerals such as salt, recreational transportation …show more content…
Humans have had the luxury of using the Oceans natural resources since the beginning of our time. With the advancements in technology, humans have continued to develop and utilize the Oceans resources at a pace that may make the Ocean unstable. We need the Ocean to be sustainable for our future and the future of the Ocean ecosystem. According to Virapat (2011), “The economic and social welfare of humankind depends to a large degree on the oceans’ productive sectors and services. The manner in which humans exploit those resources and services, have been anything but humane” (p.2). Humankind has exploited and depleted many of the living natural resources in the Ocean to the point that we now must raise protein such as salmon and shrimp outside of the Ocean just to meet the human economic and social …show more content…
Starting with the Viking trade of cod and then continuing with fisheries in Europe, Lofoten, Italy, Spain, India, and eventually the United States. Fisheries produce about 88 million tons of fish per year. In the United States, commercial and recreational fisheries employ nearly 2 million workers. This is a big industry for the coast of the U.S. as well as other coastal countries whose economy relies heavily on this industry. Fishing is not the only industry that thrives on the world oceans. Mineral extraction, tourism, marine transportation, shipping and importation, all play a huge role in our economies and international relationships. For example, the U.S. ocean dependent economy generated more than $222 billion in 2009 along! Virapat (2011) stated that the combined value of the entire ocean ecosystem in goods and services is well over $30 trillion a year. Today, many countries are looking into ways to make the ocean sustainable, once again, due to the influx of populations on the coast, and the over capacity fisheries taking away from the natural ecosystem. Overfishing, does not allow the reproduction to occur at a rate to keep up with the depletion of fish from the