Kiribati is located in the central Pacific Ocean. Credit: UNDP/Azza Aishath

By Enric Sala
WASHINGTON DC, Dec 9 2022 (IPS)

Delegates from more than 190 countries are donning thick coats and winter boots to attend the long-delayed UN biodiversity summit in Montreal, Canada—the land of caribou, beluga whales and wolverines.

They are gathering there to iron out the final details of a global deal for nature that seeks to curtail the extinction of one million species and the destruction of the ecosystems they help create.

I’ll join the delegates next week. As I trudge through the cold to speak with them about the urgent need to protect nature, I’ll be thinking of the distant southern Line Islands, a remote archipelago in the Republic of Kiribati, a nation known for its desperate battle against rising ocean levels.

Their islands could be among the first to disappear if we don’t phase off greenhouse gas emissions. But what is less known is that the southern Line Islands provide the strongest evidence that nature protection can foster ocean resilience to global warming.

In 2009, a team of scientists and I first surveyed the marine ecosystems surrounding the uninhabited southern Line Islands. What we saw was like a world from centuries ago. Fish abundance was off the charts; on every dive, we saw abundant large predators, such as sharks—an uncommon sight for even a seasoned diver. Thriving, living corals covered up to 90 percent of the ocean floor.

We thought the pristine and untouched corals were saved forever in 2015, when the government of Kiribati protected 12 nautical miles around the islands from fishing and other damaging activities in what is now the Southern Line Islands Marine Protected Area.

But then disaster struck. The same year, warmer-than-usual ocean temperatures killed half of the corals in the Southern Line Islands. The news discouraged many. If the most pristine reefs were to succumb so rapidly, then all hope is lost. Would they be able to recover?

To answer that question, we returned to the islands five years after the coral died off. I was terrified before the first dive—unsure if we’d see dead or recovering corals. But when I jumped in the water, I could not believe what I saw.

Amid massive schools of fish, the corals were back to their former richness – they had recovered completely. If we hadn’t known that half of the corals had recently died, I would have thought that nothing had changed since my first visit. They recovered faster than ever witnessed before, with millions of new coral colonies per square mile taking over the space left by dead corals.

This miracle was only possible because the reefs were fully protected from fishing. As a result, the fish biomass was enormous. Large parrotfish and schools of hundreds of surgeon fishes kept the reef healthy and seaweed-free by grazing and browsing continuously on the dead coral skeletons. Without seaweed smothering the dead corals, new corals could grow and restore the reef.

Our discovery on this expedition clearly showed that, when granted full protection from fishing and other extractive activities, marine ecosystems can bounce back. Strong protection yields resilience and replenishes our overfished ocean. We have seen this again and again, in Mexico, Colombia and the United States.

The Biden administration has pledged to protect more of the ocean under its jurisdiction, and even created a new Special Envoy for Biodiversity, currently held by Monica Medina. But there is more that countries around the world can do at a global and national level.

That is why I am carrying a strong message to Montreal: we must protect at least 30% of the Earth’s land and ocean by 2030, and we must hurry. Protecting a third of the planet is critical for biodiversity and all the benefits we obtain from it, such as oxygen, clean air and water, and food.

But it is also essential for mitigating climate change. Protecting vital areas in the ocean – and the land – will turn the tide against biodiversity loss and buy us time as the world phases out fossil fuels and replaces them with clean energy sources.

Ocean health hangs in the balance at COP15 in Montreal. But we’re already running out of time, with the summit delayed two years due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Right now, less than 8% of the ocean is under any kind of protection, and only 3% is highly protected like in the southern Line Islands.

We have eight years to quadruple all ocean protections ever achieved in human history. Some countries have announced new ocean protections, but we need a global action plan that targets the top priorities for conservation of the ocean—for the sake of biodiversity, food and climate.

This means that delegates must roll up their sleeves and do the hard work of ironing out a strong global agreement that doesn’t water down protection goals. There is no more time for podium pledges and empty speeches.

The only acceptable outcome of COP15 is a strong nature agreement including a serious commitment to protect at least 30% of our ocean by 2030.

Enric Sala is the National Geographic Explorer in Residence and the founder of National Geographic Pristine Seas. You can listen to an extended conversation about the Southern Line Islands expedition with Sala on the latest episode of the Overheard at National Geographic podcast.

IPS UN Bureau

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Whale sharks, the largest of living sharks, filter-feed on plankton and other small marine creatures, which they suck into their open mouths as they swim. Credit: Enric Sala, National Geographic Pristine Seas

By Enric Sala
WASHINGTON DC, Jan 10 2022 (IPS)

There is no other place in the world like Costa Rica’s Cocos Island National Park. The waters surrounding the island–covered with tropical forests–are a playground to countless shivers, or schools, of sharks, including hammerhead sharks, whitetip reef sharks and whale sharks.

Also boasting rays, turtles, whales and dolphins, It’s one of the world’s most biodiverse waterways. In recent years, however, industrial fishing activity has encroached on the area, threatening this unparalleled marine life.

Fortunately, Costa Rica took decisive action this month by expanding the protected waters by 27 times. They also protected an additional marine area–the Bicentennial Marine Managed Area, which is twice the size of the expanded Cocos Island National Park. The area includes no take zones and will closely monitor fishing activity.

Stories like this one are all too rare. In the last century alone, we have removed over 90% of the ocean’s large fish, yet less than 8% of the ocean is under some kind of protection. We’re still learning about the collateral damage from destructive fishing activities, like bottom trawling, which scrape up the ocean floor—the world’s largest carbon storehouse.

It’s clear that commercial fishing, global warming and pollution have decimated the ocean. Few corners of the vast ocean are safe. As a result, the seas are losing their ability to safeguard biodiversity, provide food and store carbon—all of which are critical to maintaining a livable planet, which was under intense discussion at the climate talks in Glasgow late last year.

But it is possible to restore the ocean’s benefits to people and the planet. All we must do is rewild the sea. The only catch is that we can’t wait. We have less than a decade to act.

Since 2018, I have worked around the clock and around the world with a team of scientists to identify which areas of the ocean we must protect first. We have discovered through our research and countless expeditions the trade-offs among the ocean’s benefits.

To support our work, we developed a framework that could help us maximize the benefits that humanity obtains from the ocean. We found that if we were to give equal importance to biodiversity, food and carbon, it is imperative to protect 45% of the ocean – the “right” 45%.

Even if we decided that biodiversity is not so important, we would need to protect 30%–the minimum area needed to preserve marine life and all of the benefits it provides to people.

Costa Rica is part of a growing group of world leaders that understand the benefits of protecting marine areas. At the Glasgow climate talks, Costa Rica, together with Colombia, Ecuador, and Panama, announced their commitment to create more marine reserves in the Eastern Tropical Pacific.

Establishing no-take areas along an “ocean highway” for migratory species such as tuna will actually increase fish supplies in the surrounding areas. As a result, biodiversity and economies benefit.

Earlier this month, the government of Portugal expanded a marine protected area around the Selvagens Islands, located midway between Madeira and Canary Islands. At 3,677 square kilometers, the area is now the largest fully protected marine reserve in Europe.

Countries worldwide must establish more of these protected areas by 2030 if we are to ensure that the ocean can continue to provide us with its benefits. Protections must be strong. Marine protected areas can only work their magic if all fishing and other damaging human activities are banned—and these rules are enforced.

So far, 77 countries have agreed to champion a global goal to protect 30% of the ocean—and well as land—by 2030. They are pushing to ensure that the 30×30 target is enshrined in a global UN biodiversity agreement, under negotiation now and expected to be signed in 2022.

But the world doesn’t have to wait for the ink to dry on the agreement to establish more marine protected areas. Too much is at stake. I have seen with my own eyes how nature recovers in marine reserves. More importantly, I have seen how this return of nature has helped people gain better lives.

Enric Sala is an Explorer in Residence at the National Geographic Society, the founder of Pristine Seas, and the recipient of this year’s Prince Albert I Grand Medal for his work to protect the ocean. Pristine Seas has helped to establish 24 marine protected areas, covering a total area of more than 6.5 million square kilometers — more than twice the size of India.

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