Hi everyone! In today’s second post of the week, I will be sharing what I found from 4 research articles I read during the past few days.
The first paper I found talks about air pollution. According to Isley et al. (2018), the implications of air pollution depend on where pollutants come from. In Fiji, pollutants can come from fossil fuel combustion, road vehicles, or waste burning. Air pollutants in Fiji are mainly black carbon and sulfur. After studying the risk ratios and mortality predictions of PM2.5 concentrations, Isley et al. found that reducing emissions from fossil fuel combustion will greatly improve air quality in the region. As students in Environmental Pollution, this might seem like a “duh” statement. But to the people in the Global South who have no other means of development and progress, such a finding may ignite conflicts and disagreements within the government.
2 papers I found throughout the week talk about microplastics. I briefly mentioned the definitions of microplastics in a previous post. According to Dehm et al. (2020), the implications of microplastics on the coasts of Small Island Developing States are understudied. Hence, in their paper, they focused on Viti Levu, one of Fiji’s main inhabited islands, to study the presence of microplastics in the country. Their findings challenged the common conception that microplastics are largely found in urban areas, rather than rural areas. I personally had that misconception too! Additionally, Ferreita et al. (2020) focused on Suva, Fiji’s capital, and found that microplastics were present as well, as a result of land-based human activities. A lot of the fish in the area’s coasts have high microplastic ingestion levels. Here are some of the different microplastics that they found.
I also found a paper that studied metal pollution in the region. Metals are non-biodegradable, which means that they cannot be deteriorated in the environment. In Park et al.’s (2013) paper, I learnt that there have been high levels of lead, copper, zinc, and iron in the sediments of Suva’s Harbour. There were also high levels of mercury found in lagoon shellfish. They concluded that the release of hazardous metals into the Fiji environment would not reach a plateau anytime soon, because globalization is forcing developing nations in the Global South to industrialize to economically develop. They do shed light on how doing research like theirs is not a futile exercise, since their findings can raise awareness, and pressure their governments to do something. What do you think?
Up next, Haiti. See you in the next one! ✿
References
Dehm, J., Singh, S., Ferreira, M. & Piovanno, S. (2020) Microplastics in Subsurface Coastal Waters Along the Southern Coast of Viti Levu in Fiji, South Pacific. Marine Pollution Bulletin. 156, 1-8. Available from: https://www-sciencedirect-com.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/science/article/pii/S0025326X2030357X?via%3Dihub [Accessed: 11 February 2022].
Ferreira, M., Thompson, J., Paris, A., Rohindra, D. & Rico, C. (2020) Presence of Microplastics in Water, Sediments and Fish Species in an Urban Coastal Environment of Fiji, a Pacific Small Island Developing State. Marine Pollution Bulletin. 153, 1-9. Available from: https://linkinghub-elsevier-com.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/retrieve/pii/S0025326X20301090 [Accessed: 11 February 2022].
Isley, C. F., Nelson, P. F., Taylor, M. P., Stelcer, E., Atanacio, A. J., Cohen, D. D., Mani, F. S. & Maata, M. (2018) Reducing Mortality Risk by Targeting Specific Air Pollution Sources: Suva, Fiji. Science of The Total Environment. 612, 450-461. Available from: https://www-sciencedirect-com.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/science/article/pii/S0048969717322246?via%3Dihub [Accessed: 11 February 2022].
Park, E. K., Wilson, D., Choi, H. J., Wilson, C. T., Ueno, S. (2013) Hazardous Metal Pollution in the Republic of Fiji and the Need to Elicit Human Exposure. Environmental Health and Toxicology. 28, 1-3. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3909747/ [Accessed: 11 February 2022].