In the last 3 years, Balıkesir Metropolitan Municipality teams have broken a historical record by removing 750 thousand square metres of the 1 million square metres of ghost nets collected in 8 years across Türkiye from Marmara and Aegean Seas. In this way, millions of fish were prevented from dying.

In the aquaculture programme held with the participation of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Minister of Agriculture and Forestry İbrahim Yumaklı announced that they have collected 1 million square metres of ghost nets in the last 8 years, which is big enough to fill 150 football fields.  Approximately 75 percent of the 1 million square metres of ghost nets were collected by the team led by Balıkesir Metropolitan Municipality. Fish and crab deaths were also prevented by cleaning the biggest threat to marine life.  Within the scope of the "Ghost Nets Cleaning Project" carried out in cooperation with Balıkesir Metropolitan Municipality, Çanakkale 18 Mart University, Balıkesir Provincial Directorate of Agriculture and Forestry, 250 thousand square metres of ghost nets were removed from the Aegean Sea and 500 thousand square metres of ghost nets were removed from the Marmara Sea in 3 years.

PROTECTING THE ECOSYSTEM

Yücel Yılmaz, Mayor of Balıkesir Metropolitan Municipality, stated that Balıkesir, which has the most beautiful coasts of Marmara and Aegean Seas, continues to work on improving the quality of sea water and that they have taken an important step towards protecting the marine ecosystem with ghost net cleaning activities. 

Balıkesir, which has coasts to both seas, continues to carry out many scientific projects such as increasing underwater vitality, creating artificial reefs and protecting red corals.