Africa-Press – Cape verde. The sea turtle nesting season on the island of Maio, which has been running since June, has started with reports of captures on almost all the beaches patrolled by the Maio Biodiversity Foundation, a source from the organisation warned.
Herval Silva, coordinator of the turtle preservation program, told Inforpress that the capture of sea turtles still constitutes one of the biggest challenges for the preservation of this species on the island of Maio, with cases of capture having already been recorded this season.
“People are still insisting on capturing sea turtles on the island. We can say that this season we have already found signs of capture on almost all patrolled beaches,” said the coordinator.
In addition to the problem of capture, the challenge of protecting turtles also involves mobilizing more volunteers, taking into account that, with the loss of the island’s population, according to Herval Silva, there are fewer and fewer people available to participate in the actions.
“The island of Maio has lost a lot of young people. In some communities there are no young people, only the elderly and children, which makes it difficult to have local people in some communities to work with us,” he lamented.
The Maio Biodiversity Foundation currently has around one hundred people participating in sea turtle preservation actions, focusing on intensive training in Biology, monitoring and turtle conservation for teams, leaders and monitors.
The foundation’s actions involve communities across the island, so much so that all areas have leaders, with a team that has helped the institution in patrolling and awareness-raising actions.
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