Canberra meeting on Antarctic fishing

Press, 23 February 1978, Page 16

Canberra meeting on Antarctic fishing

By

STUART McMILLAN

of “The Press”

The meeting of the Antarctic Treaty nations to be held in Canberra for three weeks from next Monday will be one of the most significant for New Zealand and the Antarctic.

The purpose of the meeting is to draw up a draft convention for the management of the marine resources of the Antarctic. An attempt will be made to set over-all quotas on the taking of krill, Antarctic cod, and other marine life.

Such a plan has been suggested before. The crunch will come when nations have to agree on limiting catches and abiding by their decision.

Japan and the Soviet Union take krill commercially. West Germany, Poland, Taiwan, Britain, Chile, Norway and the United States are conducting research. The

Canberra meeting will not attempt to set a limit for any one nation, but will try to limit the amount that may be taken altogether. Presumably the fishing nations will have to agree among themselves about sharing the total permissable catch.

The Antarctic Treaty has been a veritable model for sound international cooperation. Most of the cooperation has been scientific. What is about to happen is that commercial ventures are going to have to set limits to their own activities. The spirit of international cooperation is likely to be put to a thorough test. Some scientists have estimated that a harvest of 100 million tonnes of krill a year could be taken from the Antarctic. This is more than the total world catch of fish.

The krill is seen as an immense source of protein. But it is the key to the food chain of the Antarctic and over-harvesting could have devastating effects on other marine life. If the Canberra meeting draws up a suitable convention a further meeting will be held towards the end of this year to which the nations which take krill but are not Antarctic Treaty signatories will be invited. The Antarctic Treaty nations hope that these other nations will agree to abide by the convention. After that meeting the whole convention will go before a full consultative meeting of the AntarcTreaty nations in Washington next year. A precedent exists for checking on the activities of the various nations. The Antarctic Treaty declares the

continent should not be used for military purposes and provides for inspection of the various areas. A similar arrangement could be made about the fishing boats. The trouble will come if the nations cannot agree in Canberra, or if agreement is reached there, but other nations ignore the system which has been set up. New Zealand considers it important that the whole control of the Antarctic remains within the power of the Antarctic Treaty nations. The Antarctic is important to New Zealand because of its nearness, because New Zealand has long had an interest in it, because New Zealand makes some territorial claims there, because the ecosystems of the Antarctic reach New Zealand, because the currents around New Zealand are affected by the Antarctic, and because a great deal of New Zealand’s weather originates there.

Nor are individual nations the only threat to the continuation of the Antarctic Treaty control of the area. The resources of the Antarctic bring vividly to this part of the world the question of the so-called “North-South” dialogue. Various Third World nations are likely to argue that the resources of the Antarctic should be the common heritage of mankind. The number of officials of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation who have attended discussions on the Antarctic recently has been surprising. Suggestions have been made that the F.A.O. might seek a share in the catch of the fishing nations. That is likely to be of some concern to them. New Zealand has no plans to be one of the exploiters of the resources. This season New Zealand had about eight marine research scientists in the Antarctic,

but New Zealand has no marine research ship. An invitation has been extended by Poland for a New Zealand scientist to spend time on a Polish research vessel. An Australian scientist is at present in a West German ship. As always. New Zealand is handicapped by a lack of money. This is also noticeable in the small number of New Zealanders who attend meetings of the Antarctic Treaty nations. Some countries have large delegations of scientists, fisheries experts, minerologists, and oil company staff. As far as territorial claims go, the treaty froze all claims and the United States and the Soviet Union make no claims and recognise none. New Zealand, like other nations with claims, is becoming more assertive on the subject. If there is to be a scramble for resources, New Zealand does not want to be left behind.