Deep Threats on the High Seas

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Deep Threats on the High Seas

By Sylvia Earle
Monday, August 7, 2006; Page A15

For tens of thousands of years, hunter-gatherer societies relied on the natural world around them for food. Today some indigenous peoples still live this way and consume wildlife in a sustainable manner. It would be foolish for them to destroy the forests or plains that provide their food.

But, ironically, in our "advanced" society, we do just that. At sea, indiscriminate, careless, completely unsustainable fishing techniques are increasingly employed. They destroy the habitats that produce and replenish the resources. Commercial fishing has caused significant damage to largely unknown ecosystems in the sea; depleted numerous species of fish, seabirds and marine mammals; and doomed many others to extinction.


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With the depletion of many coastal fish stocks worldwide, such as the northeastern U.S. cod fishery, the fishing industry has moved on to the high seas -- the 64 percent of the ocean that extends beyond national jurisdiction. Fishing operations target the seamounts, oceanic ridges and deep-ocean plateaus where ownership and responsibility do not lie with any nation.

Mammoth trawl gear with names such as "canyon buster" indicate the colossal scale of the assault and the damage inflicted. In an action akin to bulldozing forests to catch songbirds and squirrels, nets mounted on massive rollers are dragged across the seabed, strip-mining everything in their paths. Sometimes a single trawl tears away as much as 10,000 pounds of sponges, corals, fish and other life from the sea floor, leaving a stark, sterile undersea desert.

The high seas are unique. Miles beneath the surface, in the absence of sunlight, animals derive energy from volcanic vents. Only in the high seas are there still some habitats free of invasive species. And only in the high seas do we find living organisms that are more than 8,000 years old, such as deep-sea corals.

These facts we know for the relatively small area of the deep ocean that has been explored. The living natural resources in the majority of the area have yet to be seen by human eyes. What especially sets the high seas apart from all other marine areas is the nearly complete lack of protection for any of this natural heritage. We owe it to ourselves and to future generations to change that. Through the leadership of the United Nations, it could soon happen.

Last month the U.N. Division for Ocean Affairs and the Law of the Sea released a report reviewing measures to protect the high seas. Ordered by the General Assembly in 2004, the report says that extremely vulnerable deep-sea habitats require protection but that fishing on the high seas often proceeds unregulated to the point of serious harm.

It notes that deep-sea bottom trawling is of particular concern, due to its tendency to result in the overfishing of both target and non-target species and to damage vulnerable ecosystems that provide critical habitat for marine life. The report cites an "urgent need" in some cases for interim steps such as a moratorium on deep-sea bottom trawling until formal conservation and management systems can be arranged.

U.N. member states have until today to respond to the report and offer their opinion on such a moratorium, which will be considered this fall by the General Assembly.

In conservation, action often comes after destruction has occurred. For the high seas, the United Nations is in a unique position to act before irreparable damage is done. With this critical decision, we can prevent the extinction of countless species and ecosystems that are only just being discovered, let alone understood.

To date, the moratorium is supported mostly by developing nations that do not have the financial resources to deploy costly deep-sea gear. It is opposed chiefly by a handful of countries with fleets of very large fishing vessels.

The United States has indicated that it wants to limit further expansion in high-seas bottom trawling for now, with the possibility of a moratorium in 2009. But three more years of trawls razing the deep-sea floor could cost us thousands of years of marine life in the making.

President Bush's recent declaration of extraordinary protection for the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine National Monument was an outstanding show of U.S. concern for marine resources. Let us reemphasize our leadership in global marine protection with strong and specific support for a moratorium on deep-sea bottom trawling, setting an example for other U.N. members.

This is our chance to protect our last undiscovered wilderness before irreversible damage is done.

The writer, a marine biologist and a leader in the field of ocean exploration, is marine council chair for Conservation International in Washington.