Friday 15 June 2012

Only in Australia?

Is it only Australia that has the political will to attempt to safeguard their marine environment with any degree of urgency? - World's largest marine reserve

Other nations seem to be taking their lead from Nero as their territorial waters sicken from increasing pollution, acidification and over-fishing. As deadlines for measures needed to replete fish stocks are missed, the target is simply put back another five years and ministers congratulate themselves on their far-sighted plans. Short-sighted and often ill-managed fishing fleets then race to beam-trawl copious amounts of ever-smaller fish from the global waters while they still can (discarding millions of tonnes of dead by-catch along the way). In the process, sustainable and carefully managed local fleets wake to find their waters fished-out and their prospects scuttled. -
Pitiful progress on oceans

Any delay in the introduction of an expanded global network of well policed marine reserves is bad news. Over 60 million sharks are finned annually, ancient coral reefs are dynamited daily and once healthy coastal waters are constantly deadened by terrestrial pollutants. In five years time our expectations of what healthy, productive oceans can offer us will be significantly lessened. In fifty years time, in the same way that we regard the Amazon rainforest as a beautiful natural ecosystem, we might think it perfectly normal to have to travel to Australia to witness a pristine and beautiful ocean the way that all oceans once looked.