What an amazing day we had for our special event. Described by Rye News as “a room full of enthusiasm”, the event saw local and national groups come together for a day of environmental activities.
Andy Dinsdale welcomed everyone to the event and following a short presentation about the project, shared an exclusive teaser from a filmic documentary by Wallowbird on marine and riverine pollution.
Gonzalo Alvarez, Chair of the United Nations Association Climate & Oceans, spoke of the link between plastic pollution and climate change. Strandliners is now an Ocean Ambassador for the United Kingdom and Andy was presented with a certificate from Gonzalo.
Thea Taylor from Sussex Dolphin Project gave a presentation about their work and Sussex Underwater showed us some of the wonderful wildlife that lives just off our coastline.
And in the middle of it all, Strandliners dumped the rubbish, previously collected from the banks of the Rother, and invited visitors to take part in the sorting!
Thank you to Cllr Harmer and Cllr Mier for visiting our event and for staying so long. We hope you survived the encounter with our rubbish.
A huge thank you to all the groups for making the event such a success:
United Nations Association Climate and Ocean
Sussex Dolphin Project
Sussex Underwater
South East Rivers Trust
Marine Conservation Society
Sussex Wildlife Trust
RSPCA Mallydams Wood Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education
Rother Voluntary Action
Rother District Council
Rother Environmental Group
Environment Agency
Rye Community Garden
Sussex Greenways
Rother Green Party
Special thanks must go to the Strandliners’ volunteers who get out and dive into these surveys, recording environmental plastic pollution around the catchment and beyond. It is our volunteers collectively who represent Strandliners as Ocean Ambassador.
The Love Our Rother event was funded by The Rivers Trust, Sea Changers, Rother District Council and a wonderful local donor, Andy McConnell, as part of the Preventing Plastic Pollution project.