Citizen science as an important source of opportunistic data to improve marine litter monitoring (Oceanlit project)

Abstract

During last years, plastic pollution has become into an important menace. The concern about it has raised quickly during the las decade withing the scientific community as well as the general public. Focusing on marine debris, every day there are more people concerned and moving against plastic pollution, such us social groups and public institutions organizing beach cleanups, recreative boats taking out marine debris from the seas, or diving centers arranging cleanups on seafloors. Every day there are more people collecting marine debris from beaches, seashores, sea surfaces and seafloors, but only in few cases an adequate identification and classification of debris collected are conducted. Improve capacities, simplify protocols, and conduct adequate trainings could provide important datasets to enhance marine debris monitoring. For this reason, OCEANLIT project in Canary Islands aims to reinforce citizen science within local groups and institutions, harmonizing data collection on different levels: i. Awareness and educative level; ii. Basic level: identifying and quantifying most common litter items; iii. Scientific level: with protocols based on scientific designs. To date, an important review on activities related with marine debris (cleanups, scientific studies, data collection, etc.) has been conducted within scientific and divulgative media, including social media, and main results has been analyzed. Also, more than 70 local teams and 40 recreative boats were identified and contacted, and specific trainings will be conducted during 2022.