{"id":15816,"date":"2025-07-07T16:20:49","date_gmt":"2025-07-07T16:20:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/topat10.com\/?p=15816"},"modified":"2025-07-07T16:20:49","modified_gmt":"2025-07-07T16:20:49","slug":"on-mexicos-caribbean-coast-theres-lobster-for-the-tourists-and-microplastics-for-everyone-else","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/topat10.com\/?p=15816","title":{"rendered":"On Mexico\u2019s Caribbean Coast, There\u2019s Lobster for the Tourists and Microplastics for Everyone Else"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

The fishermen of<\/span> Puerto Morelos, on Mexico\u2019s Caribbean coast, risk their lives every time they head out to sea to fish or dive for lobsters. Their bounty is dependent on luck, as the weather often makes it impossible to go out, while on other days the hooks they cast come back empty. These workers set out every day to find the best lobsters possible for the affluent vacationers who come to the region, while they and their families, cut off from many of the benefits of tourism development, get by on fish full of microplastics.<\/p>\n

Omar Oslet Rivera-Garibay, a researcher at the Institute of Marine Sciences and Limnology at the Universidad Nacional Aut\u00f3noma de M\u00e9xico, documented the lives of these fishermen in a recent study<\/a>. He and his colleagues report that while members of the Pescadores de Puerto Morelos fishing cooperative harvest and sell high-value seafood products to satisfy tourists\u2019 appetites, they are left with only the fish caught near the town\u2019s beaches for their own consumption. It has little commercial value and is contaminated with tiny plastic fragments.<\/p>\n

As part of their research, Rivera-Garibay and the team captured 424 fish from 29 different species using the same methods as the cooperative\u2019s partners. All were dissected, and their digestive tracts removed and examined. Contaminants were found in 57 percent of the fish, with over a thousand microplastic particles recovered. The research noted that \u201cfish caught with handlines in shallow waters near the coast had significantly more microplastics in their intestines than those caught in deeper waters.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n