This film presents the interdisciplinary and international project BASYS (Baltic Sea System Studies), financed by the European Union in the years 1996 to 1999, which investigated many aspects and influences of mankind activities on the ecosystem Baltic Sea as well as the natural influences such as climate and weather. A large database accessible to all scientists was collected during the project and should help in the future to distinguish between the natural and human effects upon the ecosystem of the Baltic Sea.

The author works on the notion of “watershed encounter” as a diverging point in history to analyze which watershed encounters shaped the Chesapeake Bay region. He argues that current restoration efforts, far from solving the current issues, only exacerbate them.

Victoria Gonzalez Carman and Maria Carman focus on the interaction between a fishing community and a group of conservation experts in Brazil. They find that although fishers classify species according to their capacity to be exploited as a resource, they may also be willing to become strategic conservationists by negotiating with conservation experts to protect some of these species.

Looking at cases of Indigenous land and sea management in Australia, Austin et al. suggest four ways Indigenous groups and institutional investors can work together to establish meaningful criteria for ensuring effective conservation outcomes.

James Hatley’s article for the ‘Living Lexicon for the Environmental Humanities’ section discusses the horizon of the ‘Aion’ (as formulated in the four geological eons), and the fact that every species is linked in genetic kinship.

The film highlights the pollution of the Baltic Sea from agricultural run-off and wastewaters, particularly in the Kocinka catchment of Poland. It offers multiple perspectives from the range of stakeholders, and is the outcome of the Soils2Sea project which ran from 2014 to 2017.

Weltmeere examines society’s relationship with the oceans in the nineteenth century, through subjects such as whale fishing, polar expeditions, the sea in literature and psychology, and marine studies.

The documentary follows trials and antics of the captain and crew from the radical activist Sea Shepherd Conversation Society, as they carry out campaigns on the ocean to save sea mammals.