Row across the Atlantic – ready to start to save the Baltic porpoise

CCB • December 14, 2021

After one and a half years of preparation Sören Kjellkvist and Måns Kämpe are now going to row across The Atlantic, with the start planned for December 14’th 2021 from the small harbour town of Lagos in Portugal.


The Row across The Atlantic is estimated to take about 3 months, the distance is more than 6000 km, which means over 3 million oar strokes, and their goal is to reach the tropical islands of the Caribbean.


Måns and Sören share a deep involvement for the oceans, and with this expedition they want to bring out the big questions about the oceans and the conditions for all life in them. It feels extra important to increase awareness of how dependent we are on life in the oceans, how humans destroy this and what we should be doing to turn this development around to let the oceans heal, recover and prosper again.

“The Baltic Harbour Porpoise is the Baltic’s own whale, but it is urgently close to extinction and red listed with only a few hundred individuals left” says Sören Kjellkvist.
Måns Kämpe adds: “Political decisions and specific changes need to happen soon, this should have been done a long time ago. Sweden’s lack of action has been criticized by the EU commission”.

Ida Carlén, expert at Coalition Clean Baltic, comments:“We work on demanding the changes required to allow the Baltic Harbour Porpoise to survive and stabilize, and the collaboration with Måns and Sören gives us a chance to bring this issue to a broader audience. A lot of people are not even aware that there is a species of whale in the Baltic, and that it is so close to extinction.”


During the expedition Måns and Sören will write daily reports, with updates about the row as well as facts and information about the Baltic Harbour Porpoise. Their goal is to raise awareness and help establish the decisions and actions required to save the only species of whale in the Baltic Sea.


The PR in Swedish is available here.

Read all about the adventure here or in their blog: https://sorenkjellkvist.se/ro-over-atlanten/

For more information about the Baltic Harbour Porpoise.

CCB is looking for a Network Officer to join our team at the CCB International Secretariat

By CCB • April 9, 2025
Coalition Clean Baltic – CCB is a politically independent network, uniting 27 environmental non-profit organizations, as well as partners and experts from 11 countries surrounding the Baltic Sea. The main goal of CCB is to promote the protection and improvement of the environment and natural resources of the Baltic Sea region by encouraging new and constructive approaches and engaging people to become part of the solution instead of part of the problem. CCB Secretariat is based in Uppsala, Sweden.

Attacks on NGOs: 570+ Organisations Join Forces to Defend Civil Society

By CCB • April 7, 2025
European civil society organisations (CSOs) are currently facing an attack coming from certain Members of the European Parliament. Spearheaded by some MEPs from the European People’s Party (EPP) and by far-right groups, this attack resorts to misleading arguments to fabricate a scandal. This portrayal has been amplified through the media, with notable exceptions of articles that attempted to clarify this misleading narrative. European CSOs are crucial to ensure the voices of citizens from different parts of Europe are heard in the EU institutions. Attacks against civil society are unfortunately not new and are exacerbated by this harmful idea. Furthermore, for-profit corporate lobbying is through the roof when compared to non-profit advocacy. In 2024, the 50 corporations with the largest lobbying budgets collectively spent nearly €200 million on lobbying the EU alone (66% more than in 2015). Comparing this to the funding environmental NGOs receive under the LIFE programme - €15.6 million annually of a €700 million yearly budget - truly shows the weakness of this ‘scandal’. This is why over 570 civil society organisations from 40 countries, including all EU Member States, have joined forces to call on those in power to act now and ensure that civil society is adequately funded and enabled to share our crucial perspectives . In this statement, we address: The source of this false narrative; Inaccurate claims made about how CSOs obtain and use funding; Why it’s paramount that CSOs receive sufficient funding; The need for civil dialogue to enable CSOs participation. Democracy is about the right of citizens to be collectively heard for building an inclusive society and a shared European future; properly funded independent CSOs are a crucial tool for that. We call on decision-makers to ensure civil society organisations can thrive and play their role in interacting with policy-makers in order to have a more fully informed decision-making process. Read the full statement here . -END Civil Society Europe (CSE) is the coordination of civil society organisations at EU level. Through its membership, CSE unites EU-level membership-based organisations that reach out to millions of people active in or supported by not-for-profits and civil society organisations across the EU. CSE was created by several civil society organisations as a follow-up to the European Year of Citizens and was established as an international not-for-profit under Belgian law in 2016. Since then, it has become the point of reference for EU institutions on transversal issues concerning civil dialogue and civic space.