October 22 – November 1
Number 3
Hobart, Australia

ECO
A Publication of Non-Governmental Environmental Organizations at theXXXI Commission on the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources Meeting

WHEN IS AN MPA NOT AN MPA?
SUNSET FOR MARINE PROTECTIONAs CCAMLR Members engage in the process ofdrafting conservation measures for the Ross Sea andEast Antarctic MPA proposals, it has emerged thatmany members believe that these proposals should
be time-limited. We aren’t just talking about
reviewing the management plan at specified
intervals, it seems. Some text suggests that after acertain period of time, the Commission would berequired to undertake a new decision on whether torenew the MPA. Thus consensus on the MPA would
have to be achieved all over again.
ECO is a bit puzzled by these “sunset” proposals.
Under the Environmental Protocol to the Antarctic
Treaty, ASPAs and ASMAs are not required to haveany such clauses, although management plans must
be reviewed every 5 years. At last year’s CCAMLR
meeting when such provisions were proposed, one
Member noted that there is no similar rule for any
MPA anywhere else in the world. Indeed, the Great
Barrier Reef and Galapagos Islands have beenpermanently designated as protected. On land there
is a similar situation. There are no time limits onprotection for the Grand Canyon, Mt. Fuji, or theSerengeti. ECO is unaware of any marine protectedareas that have an expiration date.
Time limits on management plans are entirely
appropriate, since they must adapt to changing
circumstances. But what kind of legacy would
CCAMLR leave if all the hard work to identify
areas deserving of protection could simply fadeaway in a few decades because one Member
changed its mind? Within their own countries
Members certainly would not want to leave theirnational treasures so vulnerable.
ECO entirely agrees that CCAMLR must regularly
monitor what is going on in MPAs to ensure thatthey are meeting the goals for which they weredesigned. That is best accomplished through regularreview of the management plan and options tochange protection levels, not through mandatory
expiration and renewal provisions for theConservation
Measure.
Antarctica’smarine
treasures meet the same criteria as the Great Barrier
Reef and the Galapagos Islands, and they deserve
the same protection. If CCAMLR wants to leave atrue legacy of marine protection, and continue its
global leadership in the arena of marine
conservation, it should follow global best practice indesignating MPAs without time limits.
CCAMLR IN THE SPOTLIGHT
The media spotlight on CCAMLR is intensifying,
with more major publications weighing in on thecritical decisions on the table in Hobart, Australia.
Over 200 stories have hit the media around theglobe since the meeting began.
In the US, The New York Times published an
editorial titled “A Chance to Save the SouthernOcean,” in which they urge CCAMLR Members toseize the opportunity to protect the unique,“ecologically rich” waters around Antarctica. “At aminimum, the areas proposed in the Ross Sea andaround East Antarctica should be protected; better
still if the larger areas recommended byconservationists are included.” The Washington
Post reported that the “international push to create agiant marine sanctuary in Antarctica has gotten a bigboost” due to the emergence of a joint proposal for a
Ross Sea MPA from the US and New Zealand.
New Zealand is closely following developmentswith a TV news crew arriving in Hobart on Tuesday
and newswire Scoop running a story titled: “Cry for
Antarctic marine protection in final week ofCCAMLR” highlighting the call by the great, great,great granddaughter of the man who discovered andexplored the Ross Sea, Sir James Clark Ross, for
far-reaching Ross Sea protection at the ASOC/AOA
luncheon for Delegates on Monday.
International coverage of the CCAMLR meeting
includes a blog in Nature, an interview with JimBarnes on IUU fishing and stories via Google,
Yahoo and MSN.

CCAMLR Facebook page “Likes” continue to growand are now at 12,499. Entrepreneur Sir Richard
Branson has been tweeting his support in recent
days to call for real protection for the SouthernOcean, adding his voice to the more than 1.2 million
around the world who have taken action on theissue. It is positive to see growing awareness about
what’s at stake at CCAMLR as Delegates consider
designating MPAs in the Southern Ocean.

ECO reminds delegates that in 2008 the ScientificCommittee identified 11 priority areas. TheCommission
endorsedtheCommittee’s
recommendations, setting the stage for theextraordinary amount of focused work the past fouryears.

NO DATA, NO FISH
Some CCAMLR members have been placing a very
high bar on the science required for marine
protected area to be approved. ECO wonders
whether fishing activity will be required to meet thathigh bar as well.

ECO Number 3
Hobart, Australia
30 October 2012

CCAMLR has been grappling with researchrequirements in low information fisheries. If thestandards posed by some members for scientificjustification for MPAs were to be applied tofisheries management, how much fishing would
there be in Antarctica? ECO suspects the answer is“zero”.
As the Guardian noted in its obituary of John Heap,
the legendary UK Antarctic representative for manyears: “Heap's efforts in the marine living resources
convention, to establish the first ecosystem-based
fisheries management system, were also motivatedby conservation and sustainability objectives. He
will be remembered for frequently using the phrase"no data, no fish". In other words, no fisheries
should be allowed unless there was the scientificbasis on which to manage them”.
The failure of the tagging regime in large parts ofAntarctic waters to provide useful data tosustainably manage Antarctic toothfish stocks brings
into question some Members’ commitment toresearch before conducting commercial fishing.
So far CCAMLR’s exploratory fishing regime has inmost places been an excuse for commercial fishing.
Many members want to fish in Antarctic waters but
only a few front up with research and analysis.

Production Team
Ah Lee Ming, Evan McCloud, Jade de Longhi,James Joyce, Mariano Benvenuto, Joyce Hagerman,
Sven Janssen.
ECOispublishedbynon-governmentalorganizations at international environmental
meetings. ECO is financed solely from nongovernmental sources, and thanks the AustralianConservation Foundation, Bear Gulch Fund, Centrode Conservación Cetacea (Chile), Cetacean SocietyInternational, ECO-New Zealand, Forest and BirdNZ, Friends of the Earth (Australia, Korea, Japanand International), Greenpeace (International &Netherlands), Humane Society of the US, Humane
Society International, IFAW, Korea Green
Foundation, Marine Conservation Institute (US),Marisla Foundation, Munson Foundation, Oceans
Five, Peter Scott Trust, Pew Environment Group,Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation, Sierra Club,Tinker
Foundation,WhaleandDolphin
Conservation Society, WWF-ASOI, and an
Anonymous Donor for their support.

It is time that CCAMLR ended this commercial
fishing “in drag” and returned to the commitment to“No data, no fish”.
REPRESENTATIVE SYSTEM OF ONE?
ECO reminds delegates that countries made acommitment to establish a representative system ofmarine protected area by 2012. So far only one
marine protected area has been established, for theSouth Orkneys.

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