How AI is helping our planet.
It’s easy for us land-dwellers to forget just how vital the oceans are. They cover about 71 percent of the Earth’s surface and account for 91 percent of its living space. The oceans are where life began and our species has been linked to it ever since.
Let’s talk about an organisation that is using AI for the betterment of our Earth. The Nature Conservancy is an organisation that is working dedicatedly towards the conservation of both land and water. They use science, create ideas, innovate and offer solutions to the problems and challenges that we come across while thriving to allow both nature and people live together.
Humans very conveniently forget about the oceans while ruling the lands. This 71% of Earth is being treated quite harshly. For instance, have a look at the Great Reef Barrier. A reef monitoring program recently produced the results that indicate that the northern part has been deprived of half of the coral cover that was once upon a time a vibrant community of coral.
However, there have been solutions offered to such problems; all thanks to the AI. For instance, the nature conservancy leveraged a facial recognising software to stop the practice of overfishing. This reduces the amount of time that is given towards policing fisheries which according to the Guardian takes about six hours analysing ten hours of tape. The winners of nature conservancy’s AI data science challenge also created algorithms that helped to recognise and identify when a fish was caught and also the type of the fish with the help of cameras on longline fishing boats. Therefore, the nature conservancy has been operationalising its abilities to bridge the gaps and offer solutions to the issue of lawlessness in fisheries.
To quote facts, 98% of longline tuna boast in the Pacific are operational without any human observers. Nearly $1.5 billion worth is lost yearly due to illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing in the area out of which almost ninety percent is taking place on boats in the licensed fleet. Therefore, there is a dire need to know exactly what, how much and where it is being caught in order to protect the ocean and life in it. In order to implement this, AI comes to the rescue. It allows you to keep direct eyes on activities to keep away and offer protection from illegal, ineffective as well as unsustainable practices by providing with correct and timely data. If this idea is applied worldwide, such harm will not have to be experienced due to the fear of data availability as well as accountability.
