MANY environmentalist from Japan and the rest of the world have since denounced Japan’s act, saying it blatantly violates international law and would impact the world as a whole.
However, despite cries from in and out of the country, Japan stood firm with its decision and began its wastewater discharge last August 24.
Calvin Wijk, former director of the Department of Tourism of Western Cape Province in South Africa, said the discharge of nuclear-contaminated water could wreak havoc on the global marine ecosystem and jeopardize the health of mankind for generations to come.
“You put that water back into the sea, where fish can consume that. And we know about nanoparticles, the very small nuclear particles that can enter into the ecosystem. And I will eat it, my children will eat it and the grandchildren eat it. We don’t know what the effect of that would be,” according to Calvin Wijk, Former Director, Department of Tourism of Western Cape Province.
According to Wijk, a nanoparticle entering the ecosystem could end up in the plates of the next generation through seafood consumption, and its effects on the body are still unknown.
“We should be very careful of the aftereffects, of the byproducts of development, and don’t dump the byproduct of your development onto other people. That would be my message. So, let’s work together as a common community and find solutions that are sustainable, and let’s look at the interest of future generations, and let’s build hope for the future instead of devastation and disaster,” Wijk added.
Wijk said today’s globalized world cannot afford such far-reaching global ecological and public health consequences of a certain country’s willful move.
