'Inside, the fish are black': the pollution tainting Tunisian beaches
Source: The Guardian
'Inside, the fish are black': the pollution tainting Tunisian beaches
Across the Gulf of Tunis, domestic and industrial waste is pouring into the sea, rendering stretches of coastline ‘unusable’
Simon Speakman Cordall
Tue 9 Jul 2019 07.00 BST Last modified on Tue 9 Jul 2019 07.24 BST
Samir Sdiri is insistent. “There are hardly any fish left. Those that they do catch are dirty. If you open up their gills, you can see that the inside is black.”
Against the cafe’s chatter, Lobna Ben Ali Bouazza nods in agreement. “When I was a child, my parents would let us play on the beach here all day, swimming in the sea – everything. These used to be the best beaches around. Now I take my children elsewhere.”
Outside the cafe, the residents of La Goulette, a small fishing suburb to the north of Tunis, go about their business. It’s the first few days of June and the beaches are relatively empty. A few couples drift across the sand, while upturned fishing boats lie idly in the noonday sun. These beaches will be unrecognisable in the summer, as families from throughout greater Tunis, looking to escape the soaring temperatures, take the shuttle train across the capital’s lake, past the industrial ports of Rades, and on to the beaches, where their scattershot encampments jockey for space over the crowded sands.
It isn’t just the waters off La Goulette that are causing concern. The entire Gulf of Tunis is drawing activists’ ire, as domestic and industrial waste from the capital’s 600,000 plus residents, in addition to that flowing from the ports and the industrial estates that line the Gulf, makes its way into the waters outside Tunis, impacting fish populations and presenting a clear hazard to human health.
Tunisia’s pollution issues aren’t new. Its heavy industries have been impacting water quality for years. However, since the revolution of 2011, conversation over the environmental impact of its industrial legacy has at least become possible, even if the kind of reversals activists are calling for remain some way off.
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jul/09/pollution-taint-tunisia-beaches