Unusual Stance for Minister of Conservation

For The Minister of Conservation to decline an application for a marine reserve because it conflicted with fishing is akin to claiming that the government shouldn’t create national parks because they conflict with the interests of mining. The application lodged by the Akaroa Harbour Marine Protection Society in Jan 1996 was declined last week and this outcome in 2010 is a massive blow to their vision and 14 years of hard work. These comments came today from The New Zealand Underwater Associations’ marine biologist, Peter Crabb.

Under The Biodiversity Strategy 2000, the New Zealand government committed to creating 10 % of New Zealand waters to be in marine protected areas by 2010 and to decline this application in The Year of Biological Diversity is a failure to acknowledge this commitment or embrace the concept, Crabb Says. Further to this, The Minister of Conservation decided to decline this application on the grounds of recreational and customary fishing, a right of veto more appropriately designated for The Minister of Fisheries and this sets a very worrying precedent.

Only those areas created under The Marine Reserves Act 1972 can become part of the conservation estate and under the control of The Department of Conservation. While there is around 30 % of New Zealand’s land area in national parks and reserves, there is less than 1% of our marine area in reserve. This leaves most of the sea around NZ open to threats to our unique marine biodiversity, the main one being fishing and down the list are: introduced species, pollution and global warming.

Crabb points out with the majority of our marine waters open to fishing; it is always the fishers who object most strongly to any measures of protection since they feel it affects them more than anyone else. Fishers who feel they have a right to fish more than 99% of NZ coastal area do not recognize the same right for others to have equal and similar levels of protection. The few marine reserves that have been created have all endured opposition from fishers. For a minister of the crown entity charged with guardianship of the conservation estate to succumb to the pressure of one extractive stake holder is odd, short sighted and fails basic conservation principals. Without marine reserves, the long term sustainability of any fishing let alone the viability of New Zealand’s marine biodiversity is doubtful. Marine reserves function not only as insurance policies against overfishing, but enhance fish populations, restore ecological balance and provide the only sanctuaries for large old individuals which we know perform important functions.

In nearly all of NZ’s commercial fisheries, quota reductions are necessary and many fisheries are managed on a knife edge near collapse as fish sizes get smaller and it becomes harder to catch the numbers of fish they used to, Crabb says. In addition it now appears from the research of Dr Steve O’Shea that our whales, dolphins and seals are starving and throwing themselves onto the beaches with worn teeth and ulcerated stomachs, such is the impact of overfishing on these large important species.

The non sustainable exploitation of our native fish stocks provides short term gain for the few and long term environmental harm for everyone, just like mining. That a small impoverished and long-suffering community group recognises that bits of the marine environment needs protection while The Minister of Conservation feels fishing takes precedence, is yet another worrying signal from this government about their views on the integrity of our unique biodiversity whether it’s on land or in the sea, Crabb Says.