WeFish

MPAs - A useless solution to a non-problem
by Walter Starck PhD


Australia: MPAs (marine protected areas) are an ill-considered and expensive idea that address no demonstrated problem. Bypassing full parliamentary scrutiny while permitting a single minister to exercise personal discretion in implementing a vast, costly, unneeded network of them is gross misgovernance.
The claim that international treaty obligations require establishment of the planned MPAs is untrue. Pandering for Green votes is the only real purpose.
The UN Convention on Biological Diversity deals primarily with sustainable development and the agricultural and bio-medical uses of natural resources. It imposes no demand for MPAs or obligation for any specific conservation measures. However, Article 10 (c) of this convention does require signatories to, “…protect and encourage customary use of biological resources in accordance with traditional cultural practices that are compatible with conservation or sustainable use requirements....” “Customary” and “traditional” in this context is not limited to indigenous peoples. Under this convention the obligation to protect and encourage the customary use of recreational and commercial fishing by non-indigenous Australians is in no way distinct from the obligation to protect such use by indigenous Australians.
The Global Representative System of Marine Protected Areas is an initiative of the World Conservation Union (IUCN). The IUCN is an NGO based in Switzerland. Their stated mission is to: “influence, encourage and assist societies throughout the world to conserve the integrity and diversity of nature and to ensure that any use of natural resources is equitable and ecologically sustainable”. One of their objectives is the establishment of a global representative system of MPAs. An objective by an NGO creates no obligation under international law or treaty. It should also be noted that even the IUCN has explicitly recognised that trivial increases in environmental protection should not be pursued using highly restrictive and economically expensive measures.
The Law of the Sea Treaty, under which we claim exclusive economic zone (EEZ) rights to the areas outside 12 nautical miles from land, provides that exclusive rights to resources depends on utilisation. Provision is made that other nations may petition for access to unutilised resources. Huge MPA areas combined with a fisheries harvest rate at 1/30 of the global average and excessive demand for seafood imports set the stage for a successful future petition by Asian nations for access to our vast unutilised EEZ areas.
Australia already has about 25 percent of total global MPA area. The Coral Sea and other planned expansions will then comprise about 50 percent of the global total. Biodiversity protection obligations are already over-fulfilled.
MPAs in Australia are not really about preserving marine biodiversity at all. There is no known instance of any marine species in Australia that has been lost through human impacts and none that are now threatened by fishing.

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