The Southern Ocean encircles Antarctica, and this unique ecosystem supports a diverse range of marine wildlife, including penguins, krill, fishes, seals, and whales. This area is also critically important for the major role it plays in regulating our world’s climate, absorbing vast amounts of heat and carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, acting as a carbon sink, and driving global ocean circulation, which hugely influences weather patterns worldwide. These powerful but delicately balanced systems are changing due to the climate crisis.
If we are to adequately protect this special part of our blue planet home and its incredible biodiversity, we need to act now. See below for how you can help!
The main international body responsible for the conservation of Southern Ocean marine life is called the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources, or CCAMLR. 27 member governments meet annually in October in Hobart, Australia to make decisions on the major issues. The 2024 gathering is taking place right now and you can help! (Skip to the end if you are pressed for time.)
One of the biggest challenges with CCAMLR is that this international body makes decisions by consensus agreement of its members. In other words, one or two countries can thwart science-based proposals to protect and conserve this incredibly important region. While CCAMLR has the authority to help determine the fate of Antarctica and the Southern Ocean – and by extension our blue planet that depends on this part of the world being relatively stable – there has been rising concern about its effectiveness due to limited progress on the implementation of a network of regional marine protected areas and minimal response actions to climate impacts. As a result, at a time when we need collaborative conservation action more than ever, CCAMLR’s annual meetings all too often end with exploitation being prioritized over protection.
We hope that this yea
r’s session in Hobart will result in strong results for conservation. Progress made this past summer in discussions among CCAMLR members may portend a change for the better as far as their actions for conservation.
With life-changing planetary pollution caused largely by fossil fuel companies already dramatically affecting the health of our shared ocean and the stability of the world’s climate, we need significant change. It’s clear that we must turn off the fossil fuel tap as soon as we can. Obviously, CCAMLR can’t do that, but it can help in other significant ways.
For instance, CCAMLR can take action related to the promises made by national leaders two years ago in Montreal at the biodiversity COP(15). Nations of the world agreed to protect our planet’s incredibly important and threatened biodiversity by fully protecting at least 30% of all lands, waters and ocean by 2030. A key part of that promise needs to be designation of large-scale marine protected areas (MPAs) in the Southern Ocean around Antarctica to protect and conserve the wildlife and ecosystems, increase their resiliency against warming waters and other effects of climate change, and create a stronger foundation for science-based management.
Organizations like the Antarctic and Southern Ocean Coalition (ASOC) have been working hard for many years to help CCAMLR reach consensus around some basic protections. But despite that, CCAMLR has a disgraceful track record. The last big win for conservation, following years of negotiations, was in 2017 when CCAMLR agreed to establish the Ross Sea Region MPA. Last year, the CCAMLR assembly also made an agreement to hold a meeting to improve fisheries management for krill by voting against upping the fishing quotas for krill – a cornerstone species that whales, fish, and other wildlife depend on. It’s time for CCAMLR to act much more proactively to advance conservation for this polar region and its life.
This year CCAMLR needs to build on its modest progress. There are efforts to adopt a new ecosystem-based management measure for the commercial krill fishery, as well as a push to secure four additional MPAs in the Southern Ocean. Should those MPAs be created, combined with the existing Ross Sea Region MPA, the protected area would cover 26% of the Southern Ocean, and equal approximately the size of the European Union. That’s what Antarctica and the Southern Ocean need!
The world has started to clearly see the fossil-fuel induced wrath of climate change; and that change will accelerate in the years ahead. For example, last year the Southern Ocean experienced record high temperatures and record low sea ice levels. Leading scientists believe that caused the death of all emperor penguin chicks in four of the five major colonies, totaling an estimated 9,000 chicks lost.
Additionally, the “factory fishing” of krill has soared from nearly 105,000 metric tons to approximately 415,000 metric tons, 4 times more in 2022 compared to 2007. Sea ice is at its record low again, and a new study shows that Antarctica has lost 40% of its ice shelves since 1997.
The failure of CCAMLR to take any action to address the impacts of climate change is more than alarming. They are “fiddling while the world burns” (to slightly modify the idiom about Rome burning while Nero played his fiddle). Climate change requires a coordinated global response, and every governance body including CCAMLR must do its part and seek to integrate its actions with other efforts. CCAMLR must also make sure to incorporate climate change considerations into all its decisions and actions. The member nations of CCAMLR must adopt ecosystem-based management of the commercial krill fishery and designate a strong network of MPAs.
While MPAs and science-based fisheries management will not stop climate change, they do provide a buffer and create some resilience for the ecosystems and wildlife to survive.
CCAMLR’s action, or inaction, will largely determine the fate of this unique part of our planet. It’s time for CCAMLR’s leaders to step up in a collaborative way to help protect Antarctica and the Southern Ocean, for all of us and other life with whom we share this blue planet.
Each of us can help, no matter where we live. As part of the global commons, Antarctica and the Southern Ocean are owned by no one. It’s part of our shared inheritance; it’s also part of our shared responsibility…to provide a safer, healthier future for generations to come.
You can help!
- Click here to contact your national leaders and let them know that you care about the protection of this critically important part of our blue planet. Feel free to use any parts of this blog post in your communications with them.
- Click here to connect with ASOC and learn more about the issues and how to help in other ways.
- Click here to tell CCAMLR to act now! Demand that CCAMLR break the impasse and follow through on its promise to create a network of MPAs.