Please Sign The Petition To Save The Dugong In Okinawa

The first petition is online here, it is easy to sign and just takes a minute. Do take a look! Save the Dugong Campaign Center notes:

Japan will host and the Japanese government will chair the 10th meeting of the conference of the parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD COP 10) in 2010. We believe the Japanese government has the responsibilities to lead the international conservation efforts. We thus request the Japanese government:

1. To implement the IUCN Resolution (Res. 4.022).

2. To designate immediately the Okinawa Dugong as a National Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.

The International Union of Conservation of Nature (IUCN), a Swiss-based international environmental protection NGO declared 2010 as the "International Year of the Dugong" in its support to protect the dugong during the 2010 UN Year of Biodiversity. IUCN rates the Dugong as Vulnerable on its Red List, which is a better status than Endangered but worse than Near Threatened. They have campaigned for this friendly sea creature since 2002:

The dugong, the only herbivorous mammal that is strictly marine, is long-lived and reproduces slowly. It relies on seagrasses of coastal habitats which are often under pressure from human activities. Dugongs are also impacted by pollution, disease, hunting, and incidental drowning in fishing nets. The species is listed as Vulnerable in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.

Source: IUCN Species News (2002)

The IUCN resolution requests the Japanese government to conduct an Environmental Impact Assessment (including "non-construction option") for the construction of the US Marine Corps facility at Henoko, Okinawa, Japan, and to establish and declare an action plan to avoid or minimize the adverse effects on the Okinawa dugong.

Ten Thousand Things writes:

Some DC pundits are calling US miltary escalation plans for Okinawa and Guam today's real life Avatar. 100 bases in Japan & Okinawa (20% already militarized). 1/3 of Guam already militarized. And what remains of these small islands' coral reefs, irreplaceable biodiversity, indigenous cultures facing more threats from US military expansion.

From the Center for Biological Diversity -- Military Plans Threaten People, Beauty of Guam & Okinawa -- Take Action:

Last month, the Center for Biological Diversity submitted comments to the Navy on plans to more than double the military presence on the island of Guam -- threatening imperiled species and islanders' well-being at the same time.

The military buildup would send 24,000 military personnel to the island by 2020, increasing Guam's population by 14% in the long term and by 45% during the peak of the buildup. Plans include a proposal for dredging Guam's most popular diving destination that would devastate coral reefs, the largest mangrove forest under U.S. jurisdiction, and imperiled species like the scalloped hammerhead shark.

Making matters worse, this buildup is in addition to the U.S. military's plan to construct a massive military air base off Okinawa , Japan -- ruining some of the last habitat for the highly endangered Okinawa dugong, cousin to the manatee. The Center has been fighting to protect the dugong since 2003.

Said Center Conservation Director Peter Galvin:

"The military's so-called "transformation in the Pacific" will result in massive environmental destruction in Guam and increase environmental destruction in Okinawa. Destroying the environmental and social well-being of an area, even in the name of 'national or global security,' is itself like actively waging warfare against nature and human communities...

The U.S. Military Transformation in the Pacific Program will not solve our community-relations problem in Okinawa and will just exacerbate existing ones in Guam--all the while destroying critical environmental areas in both places."

Take action now to "Save Guam Wildlife" and "Defend The Dugong"