“I remember our beautiful beach before the pollution,” says Brittany resident Jean Hascoet, who leads the local campaign group Baie de Douarnenez Environnement. “Now, with thousands of pigs near our town, everything is different.”
Across France and Spain, Europe’s shorelines are being choked by toxic algal blooms. Scientists are clear on the cause: decades of chemicals leaching into waterways. Poorly handled human sewage, as well as fertilisers and excess manure from ever-expanding factory farms, are to blame.
