Epilogue – Atlantic row aborted after dangerous and unusual weather conditions

CCB • February 11, 2022

Sören and Måns set out to row the Atlantic ocean from Lagos (Portugal) to Antigua (West Indies) on the 28th of December after having to wait over two weeks for weather conditions to stabilize. When they were just one day from reaching their intermediate destination of Tenerife in the Canary Islands, the wind changed drastically and started pushing them northwest out into the open Northern Atlantic, far away from the needed trade winds towards the Caribbean.

They struggled through difficult wind and waves and finally managed to land on Madeira. By then they were delayed over a month and with all margins of time, budget and resources used up. Waiting for manageable conditions to continue south and towards Antigua, the risk of going into the hurricane season would be unacceptably high. The portuguese trade winds seem to have changed into a much less reliable behaviour, it is unbelievable how a storm from the Atlantic could reach so far south and pull us all the way up to Madeira. Facing these circumstances we have no choice but to terminate the project, and declare Madeira the final destination.

Our involvement in life in the oceans remains unchanged, and we hope that we can still create enough attention for the Baltic harbour porpoise to help save them from extinction. We gave it our best shot, however we are humble towards the immense forces of nature. It has been an extraordinary experience, very different from what we expected, challenging, emotional and extremely tough. The Atlantic will still be there…

”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.

”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” says Måns Kämpe.

Ida Carlén, expert at Coalition Clean Baltic, adds: ”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.”


NOTES

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.