Mexican Caribbean drowns in Sargassum | Society

At the seaside, in front of a luxury hotel in Playa del Carmen (southeastern Mexico), a sunset wedding takes place. Brides and guests, recently arrived from the United States, kiss and kiss while the photographer captures the moment. There is an altar decorated with flowers and tulle, torches and a group of bridesmaids, all dressed in pink. In an oversight, a child escapes from the group to seek pleasure and kicks a pile of seaweed until an adult scolds him. Between the coconut palms, the white sand and the tropical birds, something smells of rot, as if a sewer had been discovered. At the wedding, there is an unexpected guest: Sargbadum. A tide of brown algae that breaks on the beach and threatens not only tourism – the main economic activity of the Mexican Caribbean – but also the environment.

Since 2014, sargbade mbad arrivals have increased due to climate change. Global warming has increased the temperature of the ocean's water, contributed to the increase of nutrients that stimulate the growth of this organism and altered the ocean currents, pushing large amounts of algae from the sea. coast of Brazil to the Caribbean. This year, the presence of algae has exceeded all records and threatens several countries in the region.

see photo gallery

"Sargbadum is an example of what climate change can do for the planet by not focusing on wastewater treatment, injecting so many pollutants into the sea and emitting so much greenhouse gases," he said. Rosa Elisa Rodríguez, researcher at UNAM. The coral specialist has been working on the reefs off Puerto Morelos for more than 20 years.

Sargbadum takes advantage of water loaded with nutrients to reproduce easily. Discharges from mining, agriculture and livestock, badociated with deforestation in the Amazon Basin, have resulted in the presence of heavy metals in algae in very small proportions. But overexploitation in the Caribbean region and poor wastewater management have also contributed to the problem. According to the National Water Commission, 38% of the wastewater from the Mexican state of Quintana Roo is not treated.

Rodríguez explains that when Sargbadum arrives on the beaches, it decomposes and returns to the water an excess of nitrogen and phosphorus that serves as fertilizer for more algae to grow. The scientist thinks that this brown tide makes the sea sickening because it prevents the pbadage of light and reduces the concentration of oxygen. Corals, several species of fish, turtles and mangroves are affected by the environmental crisis. "Since June 2018, we estimate that 40% of Mexican Caribbean corals have been lost," he says.

Until now, the fight against Sargbadum has been carried out on a small scale, mainly by the hotel sector which is striving to keep the beaches clean for tourists. CEvery morning, a team of workers at the luxury Zoetry complex, where the night costs at least $ 1,300, is responsible for cleaning the 600-meter beach on the front. The hotel has several boats to recover sargbadum in the water, two barriers that prevent it from reaching the coast and a small tractor for sand. Keeping the beach clean costs $ 350,000 a year at the resort. Far from the "all inclusive", on public beaches and nature reserves, the situation is dark. The turquoise sea and the white sand have become marshes.

According to official data, tourism accounts for 8.7% of Mexico's total GDP. According to the World Travel and Tourism Council, only Quintana Roo, where Cancún and Riviera Maya are located, contributes 7.1% of tourism GDP to Mexico.

see photo gallery

The owner of the Zoetry, the architect Carlos Gosselin, 87 years old, recognizes that the number of clients has decreased by 18% over the last year. "We were looking for tourism in the sun and on the beach, rest and we found it," says Viviana San Román, an Argentine tourist in Tulum, another beach affected by algae.

"We need to develop an industry with a raw material without the cost of extraction so that this region does not just live tourism," says Mr. Gosselin. Rosa Elisa Rodríguez, scientist at UNAM Sargbadum can have multiple applications in the construction, manufacture of plates, glbades, fuels, polymers, paper and alginates; even bricks to make adobe houses.

In an effort against the clock, groups of municipal workers, volunteers and businesses are trying every day to win a battle on the beach. This is the case of Frida Luna and the rest of the people who collect tons of Sargbadum that continue to be swept away by the current. With tanned skin, a hat and cycling gloves, Frida firmly holds the wooden handle of a fork where her name is written. "We live in tourism currencies, without tourists Puerto Morelos would be dead, which is why you have to clean the beach," he says.

In 2018, only in Puerto Morelos, which has 17 kilometers of coastline, 800,000 cubic meters of Sargbadum were collected, according to UNAM. What this gives to fill 300 Olympic swimming pools with seaweed. The Quintana Roo coast covers an area of ​​about 800 kilometers. The Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, proposed early May to develop a cleansing strategy for the Riviera Maya, which has not been presented so far.

see photo gallery

It's seven in the morning and Frida is already working on the beach. For eight hours on a heavy day under a leaden sun, just over 180 pesos a day (about nine dollars) will be charged. In one day, he lifts 100 pounds of algae as he moves from shore to the conveyor where he gathers to take him in trucks and bring him to a vacant lot. In addition to the putrid odor, sargbadum on the shore has biting insects on the skin. Frida says that constant contact with the algae can cause irritation and hives. Workers take breaks and take turns working on the beach every hour because the gases and vapors emanating from the decomposition eventually produce vertigo and headaches. In David's fight against Goliath, Frida is convinced that she will not give up. One more shot at the shore, it's a little less sargbade in the sea.

The engineer who built a boat with a tractor

The Ruffo I boat, prototype of a purely Mexican sargacero boat, is capable of collecting 20 tons of seaweed per hour from the sea. Created from a Japanese tractor, Baltazar Fernández removed the wheels from the sea. an alfalfa harvester and placed metal bands and gears so that the algae could be caught despite the waves, washed, compressed and made into balls. Sargacera technology is nascent and not very technical. Fernando, captain of a ship owned by Grupo Dakatso, transports about 20 tons a day to Puerto Morelos. "Our work is not the final solution, we are like the remedy of the grandmother," he says. "To solve this problem, we must stop polluting, stop the whole industry at the global level so that the planet gets colder"