A state-funded fisheries research center has announced a project for restoring marine ecology by cultivating different kinds of seaweed.
The East Sea Fisheries Research Institute said that it has started the marine reforestation project by using seaweed cultivation technologies it has developed since 2002.
It unveiled the project at a fishing village in Pohang, North Gyeongsang Province on Thursday (July 13).
The institute, affiliated with the National Fisheries Research and Development Institute, said that the marine forest under the sea along the east and south coasts has been destroyed by pollution and rising sea temperatures.
Faced with a rapid desertification of the sea along the coast, the institute embarked on research to find how to restore the destroyed ecology. It succeeded in developing technologies to cultivate seaweed after four years of research.
The institute said it will transfer the technologies to municipal authorities along the coast to make use of them in combating the destruction of seaweed which serves as shelter and breeding grounds for fish and other creatures.
Seaweed also acts as a purifier for the sea as it produces oxygen and absorbs carbon dioxide, according to the institute.
Widespread marine desertification has taken place along Koreas coasts ranging from the southernmost island of Jeju to the East Sea, breaking down the undersea ecosystem.
