Are greenies sacrificing humpbacks for toothfish?

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Toothfish more important the Whales? – Photo Niwa

Recently the green NGOs accused the Government of siding with the fishing industry when they refused to back a United States proposal for marine protection in the Ross Sea.

Is the Government kowtowing to industry as they suggest, or is this yet another green own goal? The US proposal preferred by the greenies is not as environmentally friendly as the NGOs claim.

Let’s start with where the greenies are right. It would be better if NZ and the US agreed. CCAMLR (the international body running this gig) operates on consensus. We have to convince all nations involved to sign up to any change, so starting off with disagreement doesn’t help. But does that mean we should toe the US line or should they have agreed with us?

It is also true that the US proposal would make life for those fishing the toothfish fishery more difficult, because it bans fishing in some of the most productive fishing areas. But would it actually improve protection of the environment overall?

The US proposal is zoned in more than half of its area to allow commercial fishing for either toothfish or krill, whereas the New Zealand proposal is for a ‘no-take’ marine reserve throughout. So the quality of the reserve in our proposal is superior, there’s been a lot of political slipperiness over recent years over the use of the words “marine reserve”. We all know size isn’t everything, but even if you include the ‘reserves’ where they allow fishing, the area of the US proposal is still smaller than the NZ proposal. On the face of it this doesn’t sound like the greener option. When examined closely the US proposal doesn’t protect some environments at all. The idea of ’representative’ areas of MPAs is to protect a bit of all types of ecosystems, as an insurance policy. The US proposal fails this important test.

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