Speak Up for Blue Podcast Network

Does the ocean remember? Can we suppose the ocean records memory in the continuity of the marine life reliant on it for sustenance, in the energy it stores from the sun, in the voyages and explorations it has supported through time? The ocean stores energy and sustenance as both remembered and generated knowledge to come, and in its wisdom holds the opportunities for sustainability and for our survival. WORLD OCEAN RADIO World Ocean Radio is a weekly series of five-minute audio essays available

The family behind the world's largest salmon farming company built a global industry. Now one of its members is asking how it can be sustainable to grind up fish from poorer countries, ship them across the world, and feed them to salmon sold to wealthier shoppers. In episode 2048, Andrew Lewin follows farmed fish from your plate back to the fishmeal boat to answer him. More than half the seafood eaten worldwide now comes from farms, and most of it is fed. Andrew breaks down what fishmeal and fi

More than half the seafood eaten on Earth now comes from fish farms, and most of those farmed fish are raised on fishmeal made from wild-caught fish. Maya Martin, deputy editor at The Outlaw Ocean Project, joins Andrew Lewin to unpack Food for Feed, a five-year investigation that traced fishmeal from the ships that catch it, through the plants that grind it, to the farmed fish on your plate. Maya explains how forage fish like sardinella and anchoveta are pulled from waters off West Africa, Peru

Picture a big sign over the seafood counter promising sustainable fishing, with a fish every independent guide says to avoid sitting on ice right below it. In most countries nobody broke a rule, because the word "sustainable" on seafood has no legal definition. In this final episode of our sustainable seafood week, Andrew Lewin walks you through how to see past that sign and choose seafood you can feel good about. You'll learn how to use the eco-labels and seafood guides that have already done

Off the south coast of England, about 100 kilometres out, sits Haig Fras, a granite reef covered in jewel anemones and cup corals. For years it was protected on paper, yet heavy fishing gear could still drag across it. In March 2024, that finally changed. In this episode, Andrew Lewin explains why where we fish matters as much as how much we fish, and what it takes to turn a line on a map into real protection. Andrew breaks down the difference between midwater and bottom trawls and puts the dam

Your research could change how the ocean is protected. If policymakers, funders and the public can't connect with it, it stays in the journal. In this episode of the Ocean Leaders Podcast, Andrew Lewin sits down with his Pisces Oceans colleague Kirsti Burnett, a marine biologist who went from writing in the formal IMRaD structure to teaching storytelling workshops for scientists. Kirsti shares how a documentary first pulled her into science, how teaching shark awareness dives in St. Martin taug

A Kemp's ridley sea turtle, the most endangered sea turtle on Earth, gets swept into a shrimp trawl. It hits a metal grid, slides out through a flap in the net, and swims away. That small trapdoor, the turtle excluder device, is one of the biggest success stories in fisheries management, and in late August 2026 a US federal appeals court upheld the rule extending it to skimmer trawl boats 40 feet and longer. In this episode, marine biologist Andrew Lewin walks through the bycatch fixes that are

If war was once driven by oil, it has now become a function of electricity as its foundational resource, enabled by a grid which is currently unable to meet today’s ever-increasing demand. Where is all that new energy to come from? WORLD OCEAN RADIO A weekly series of five-minute audio essays available for syndicated use at no cost by college, community and public radio stations worldwide, providing coverage of a broad spectrum of ocean issues from science and education to advocacy, exemplary p

Five centuries ago, explorers off Newfoundland described cod so plentiful that a weighted basket lowered into the sea came back full. By July 2, 1992, so few remained that Canada shut the northern cod fishery overnight. About 30,000 people lost their work in what became the largest single layoff in Canadian history. In this first episode of a week-long sustainable seafood series, Andrew tells the story of how the collapse happened and how slowly the cod came back. Andrew then breaks down the wo

37 shark and ray species documented in Benin, the result of more than 15 years of fieldwork by fisheries biologist Dr. Houangninan Midinoudewa. He has built Benin's first dedicated shark and ray research program from almost nothing on the Gulf of Guinea. On this episode of the Beyond Jaws podcast, Andrew Lewin and shark scientist Dr. David Ebert explore what he's found and why West Africa is the next frontier for elasmobranch research. Houangninan shares how Jacques Cousteau's films inspired hi