Antarctic Treaty System An Assessment: Proceedings of a Workshop Held at Beardmore South Field Camp, Antarctica, January 7-13, 1985 (1986) / Chapter Skim
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13. The Antarctic Treaty System as an Environmental Mechanism - An Approach to Environmental Issues
13. The Antarctic Treaty System as an Environmental Mechanism - An Approach to Environmental Issues
Pages 195-210
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From page 195... ...
Additional conventions have extended the regulation of certain human activities to a wider area of the Southern Ocean. From an environmental standpoint, the primary element in the treaty system is the requirement that the unique features of the Antarctic environment be safeguarded and made available to people of all nations for scientific research and their peaceful enjoyment.
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From page 196... ...
In these areas, and especially around the coasts of the Antarctic Peninsula and its off-lying island groups, there are areas of primitive soil that support a surprising complexity of moss, hepatic and lichen vegetation, and associated soil animals. In these regions there are a few patches of the two kinds of higher plant native to Antarctica (the grass Deschampsia antarctica and the cushion plant Colobanthus crassifolius)
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From page 197... ...
Likewise, the immense expanses of ocean and floating pack ice around the Antarctic, driven and mixed before wind and current, have a great capacity to disperse pollution and are most unlikely to bear any detectable impact from localized human activities, even up to the scale of a substantial oil spillage. The main extensive human activity in these areas -- fishing for ~ (Eunhausia sunerba)
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From page 198... ...
People have made incursions into it, usually for short periods, in pursuit of resources or information that they can carry away. This was the approach of the initial sealing incursions between 1780 and 1830, which rapidly brought the fur seals of South Georgia, the other sub-Antarctic islands, and the South Shetland and South Orkney island groups to near extinction.5 The pressures were intensely competitive, and because the resource was open to all comers, with no sovereign interest in regulating its exploitation, it was quickly depleted and its habitat abandoned.6 A very similar approach was adopted by the twentieth century whaling industry, although here regulation was attempted once it was clear that unchecked open access and competitive exploitation threatened to destroy the interests of all the exploiters.
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From page 199... ...
One way of viewing the present challenge to the ATS is to ask whether it can ensure the implementation in Antarctica of the broad objectives of the World Conservation Strategy (WCS) .8 This analysis recognizes the importance of development of the world environment for human welfare but stresses that it is in the interest of all people for this development to be managed so that it provides for the sustainable use of the renewable resource base.
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From page 200... ...
The state of the environment, the productivity of its systems, the degree of pollution, and the operation of activities permitted within conservation and management plans shall be monitored and periodic reports prepared and published; and (9) There shall be a consultative process, in which interested parties may participate, to adjust activities that threaten established environmental goals or appear liable to create unforeseen hazards, and this process shall include effective procedures for the resolution of disputes ENVIRONMENTAL CONSERVATION WITHIN THE ANTARCTIC TREATY SYSTEM Two quite distinct approaches to environmental questions, in a broad sense, are evident in the ATS.
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From page 201... ...
that no actor activity having an inherent tendency to modify the environment over wide areas within the Antarctic Treaty Area should be undertaken unless appropriate steps have been taken to foresee the probable modifications and to exercise appropriate controls with respect to the harmful environmental effects such uses of the Antarctic Treaty Area may have; (c) that in cooperation with SCAR and other relevant agencies they continue, within the capabilities of their Antarctic scientific programme, to monitor changes in the environment, irrespective of their cause, and to exercise their responsibility for informing the world community of any significant changes caused by man's activities outside the Antarctic Treaty Area....
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From page 202... ...
They will refrain from activities having an inherent tendency to modify the Antarctic environment unless appropriate steps have been taken to foresee the probable modifications and to exercise appropriate controls with respect to harmful environmental effects; 4. m ey will continue to monitor the Antarctic environment and to exercise their responsibility for informing the world community of any significant changes in the Antarctic Treaty Area caused by man's activities.
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From page 203... ...
concluded in 1980 and entered into force in 1982. This is an ambitious instrument that sets out to conserve the marine living resources of the Antarctic and Southern Ocean area south of the Antarctic convergence, including birds, in accordance with principles of ecosystem conservation.
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From page 204... ...
The questions facing CCAMLR in fulfillment of its own objectives are whether it can so regulate fishing of the depleted finfish stocks that there will be a return to higher catches on a sustainable basis and whether it can so regulate krill exploitation that the health of the Antarctic marine ecosystem as a whole is sustained.
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From page 205... ...
It was the recommendation of the last consultative meeting that all research activities and supporting logistics activities that are likely to have a significant impact on the Antarctic environment should be subject to such assessment. The same specific approach has also been evident in the discussions, at successive consultative meetings, on how to regulate possible minerals exploration and exploitation.
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From page 206... ...
Finally, scientific study and monitoring are built into all parts of the ATS and into the program of SCAR. Open publication and broad international discussion of scientific findings are implemented through a well-established and effective consultative process.
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From page 207... ...
The treaty system flashes an amber light signifying a clear intent to regulate. This warning light appears to have failed only with respect to finfish exploitation, but this came about because of the sudden arrival in the region of distant-water fishing fleets evicted by the rapid extension of 200-mile fishing zones elsewhere in the world.
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From page 208... ...
The second is the common wish of the parties not to have to fall back on the use of territorial jurisdiction, although this remains a possible alternative regulatory basis if all else fails. It is clear that there are gaps in the series of measures adopted under the treaty.
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From page 209... ...
we suggest that the general and specific actions set out above are the ingredients of a continental conservation strategy embracing the philosophy of RecommendatiOnS VIII-13 and IX-5 of the treaty and the nine aims noted above. It would not be difficult to present the specific actions taken to date, together with the broad framework of an agreed policy to prevent environmental damage from minerals-related activities, in such a form.
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From page 210... ...
1984. A Visitor 'S Introduction to the Antarctic and Its Environment, British Antarctic Survey, Natural Environment Research Council (Cambridge)
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