Two representatives from the Faculty of Fisheries and Marine Sciences, Universitas Brawijaya (FPIK UB) Prof. Aida Sartimbul and Sonia Putri M (Postgraduate students) attended the Southeast Asia Pacific (SEAP) multilateral collaboration activity in the form of a scientific meeting, documentary film production, and final coordination and proposal submission plan for the 2nd stage for nine days (13/3-21/3/2025).
“This activity aimed at determining the sources and distribution of Microplastics in Southeast Asia, the role of MPs as vectors of pollution and disease, and to analyze their impacts on capture and aquaculture fisheries and humans,” said Prof. Aida.
She added, Microplastics have contaminated all our food and life, starting from livestock products, agriculture, fisheries, especially our drinking water.
In the Environmental Pollution journal, the American population has consumed around 11,469 MPs particles each year, or around 30 MPs particles per day. It could be that Indonesians have consumed even more,” said Prof. Aida.
In general, there are four activities in Thailand, which include making a documentary film, completing the writing of articles and their publication, a scientific seminar on research results, evaluation of research results followed by discussions for the sustainability of the SEAP program phase 2.
The making of this documentary film covers the entire series of activities, from sampling, laboratory activities, to the results seminar.
The shooting was carried out in several places as representatives of the actual conditions, namely Si Racha Beach (Gulf of Thailand), Kasetsart University’s Marine Station located in Si Racha, about 110 km southeast of Bangkok, the Biotechnology and Science laboratory and meeting room, Faculty of Science, Kasetsart University, Mueang Samut Prakan – Thai Ban Mangrove Village, and the meeting room at the Ibis Bangkok Hotel.
In the film making, the Indonesian Team was tasked with demonstrating the steps of microplastic analysis in fish in stages starting from fish dissection, sorting of meat, stomach, and gill parts, the destruction process, MPs analysis starting from identifying types, shapes, colors, and sizes, to calculating the abundance of MPs and analyzing the types of polymers.
On this occasion, discussions and interviews were also held about the implementation of SEAP, the challenges faced by each country, and the solutions that have been implemented.
The interview was conducted directly by the person in charge of the SEAP project from the University of Stirling-UK, A/Prof. Sabine M-Surget and guided by Ivan, a film production professional from Barcelona.
The highlight of this multilateral and multi-year research collaboration was a scientific seminar and discussion of future program plans. This activity was carried out at the Ibis Bangkok Hotel on (20/3/2025). Each country involved presented the results of their respective research related to MPs to provide information on developments, obstacles, and solutions that were implemented.
Delegation from Universitas Brawijaya, Prof. Aida Sartimbul delivered a presentation entitled “Impact of MPs on Fisheries and Aquaculture in Indonesia: Case Study in Bali Strait, East Java, and Jakarta Bay”.
While Sonia Putri Maulidya delivered a presentation entitled “Microplastic Contamination in Pelagic Fish from the Bali Strait: Analyzing Abundance in Flesh, Gills, and Stomach”.
For information, the SEAP program has funded four research titles, two of which have involved team members from Indonesia, namely BRIN and UB.
The SEAP which is in collaboration with UB is entitled: “Sources, impacts and solutions for plastics in South East Asia coastal environments”, which is divided into 4 work packages, namely the first Source and sink of MPs, MPs degradability, MPs vectors of contaminants and pathogens, and the fourth impact of MPs on Fisheries, Aquaculture, and Human Health”.
This research collaboration is a multilateral and multi-year collaboration (2021-2024) in collaboration with several universities (University of Stirling-UK, Herriot-Watt University-UK, Kasetsart University-Thailand, Universitas Brawijaya -Indonesia, Swinburne University of Technology Sarawak Campus-Malaysia, Nanyang Technological University-Singapore, and Mons University-Belgium) and one institution (National Oceanography Centre-UK) funded by 3 (three) funding sources, namely the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)-UK (£668,055), National Oceanography Centre-UK (£53,772), and National Research Foundation (NRF)-Singapore (S$1,243,790.40) with MoU number: NERC Ref: NE/V009621/1 – NOC Ref: NE/V009591/1 – NTU Ref: REQ0178480, signed by all heads of institutions. (AIDA/UB PR/ Trans. Iir).
