Trelew, Argentina:
A lagoon in Argentina’s southern Patagonia area has turned vibrant pink in a striking, but frightful phenomenon professionals and activists blame on pollution by a chemical used to preserve prawns for export.
The colour is brought on by sodium sulfite, an anti-bacterial solution utilised in fish factories, whose waste is blamed for contaminating the Chubut river that feeds the Corfo lagoon and other water sources in the area, according to activists.
Residents have lengthy complained of foul smells and other environmental difficulties about the river and lagoon.
“Those who should be in control are the ones who authorize the poisoning of people,” environmental activist Pablo Lada told AFP, blaming the government for the mess.
The lagoon turned pink last week and remained the abnormal colour on Sunday, stated Lada, who lives in the city of Trelew, not far from the lagoon and some 870 miles (1,400 kilometers) south of Buenos Aires.
Environmental engineer and virologist Federico Restrepo told AFP the coloration was due to sodium sulfite in fish waste, which by law, should really be treated ahead of becoming dumped.
The lagoon, which is not utilised for recreation, receives runoff from the Trelew industrial park and has turned the colour of fuchsia ahead of.
But residents of the region are fed up.
In current weeks, residents of Rawson, neighboring Trelew, blocked roads utilised by trucks carrying processed fish waste by way of their streets to therapy plants on the city’s outskirts.
“We get dozens of trucks daily, the residents are getting tired of it,” stated Lada.
With Rawson off limits due to the protest, provincial authorities granted authorization for factories to dump their waste alternatively in the Corfo lagoon.
“The reddish color does not cause damage and will disappear in a few days,” environmental handle chief for Chubut province, Juan Micheloud, told AFP last week.
Sebastian de la Vallina, preparing secretary for the city of Trelew disagreed: “It is not possible to minimize something so serious.”
Plants that approach fish for export, mostly prawns and hake, create thousands of jobs for Chubut province, home to some 600,000 men and women.
Dozens of foreign fishing corporations operate in the region in waters beneath Argentina’s Atlantic jurisdiction.
“Fish processing generates work… it’s true. But these are multi-million-dollar profit companies that don’t want to pay freight to take the waste to a treatment plant that already exists in Puerto Madryn, 35 miles away, or build a plant closer,” stated Lada.
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