Regime ‘too secretive’

Press, 28 January 1988, Page 4

Regime ‘too secretive’

By

OLIVER RIDDELL

in Wellington The proposed minerals regime for Antarctica has been criticised for being too secretive and not providing for the release of data on minerals proposals. The Antarctic and Southern Ocean Coalition said full availability of information would be vital to the success of all environmental protection measures in the minerals convention.

Openness would be crucial to organisations outside the convention which wanted to comment on an exploration or de-

velopment application. The convener of the coalition, Ms Cath Wallace, said the draft negotiating text had been imbued with the ethos of minimum rather than maximum release of information and reports. Disagreement has focused on Article 17 of the draft text, which deals with the availability and confidentiality of data and information. This adds two provisos to availability:— © That data and information of commercial value deriving from prospecting may be retained

by the applicant; and ® That data and information deriving from exploration and development shall be confidential to its proprietors. Ms Wallace said . these provisos on the retention of information would severely restrict independent assessment of a proposal’s impacts by institutions of or parties to the convention, or outsiders. Public confidence in the convention and the quality of decisions within it would depend on public access to information so that submissions could be made and considered.

Public information should include the applications and most of their supporting information, she said, as well as environmental impact assessment documents, management schemes, the recommendations and reports of all the institutions and their advisers, monitoring data and inspection reports. Yet some of the Antarctic Treaty parties, keen to maximise their mining opportunities, were supporting proposals that even the advisory committees of the convention should not receive full information.