News

October-November 2006

This is an article from WaveLength Magazine, available in print in North America and globally on the web.
To download a pdf copy of the magazine click here: > DOWNLOAD

by Alan Wilson

PROVINCE STAYS CASE
In June 2005, biologist Alexandra Morton launched a private prosecution under Canada’s Fisheries Act, to protect wild salmon from the escape of millions of sea lice from a fish farm. The Province of BC took over the prosecution and in August, William Smart QC, a special prosecutor appointed to review the case, stayed the charges as unlikely to produce a conviction. However, Smart agreed that “it appears to us that there is validity to Ms. Morton’s assertions that sea lice from fish farms are having a deleterious effect on the pink salmon population in the Broughton Archipelago.” Morton is now asking the Attorney General of BC to allow her prosecution to proceed to the courts at her own cost, noting that the function of private prosecution is to safeguard against inertia and partiality on the part of authority.

US COURT TO HEAR ORCA DEFENSE
The US Federal Court ruled in August that it will grant Canadian environmental groups the right to participate in the fight against a lawsuit brought by industry groups. The industry groups are challenging the US government’s decision to protect the Southern Resident Orcas as an endangered species. Represented by Sierra Legal Defence Fund, the Georgia Strait Alliance and the Western Canada Wilderness Committee will join with their US partners to defend protection of the Southern Resident Orcas
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“The Southern Resident Orcas are a transboundary species,” says Sierra Legal lawyer Lara Tessaro. “Their survival depends on critical habitat on both sides of the Canada-US border. ”Without strong legal protection from both countries, we will condemn these whales to extinction.”

Listed as an endangered species under the Canadian Species at Risk Act, the Southern Resident Orcas are at grave risk of extinction throughout the range of their habitat, which covers Puget Sound in Washington and north through Georgia Strait. These orcas face numerous environmental threats, including the loss of salmon prey, toxic contamination, vessel traffic and noise pollution.

“These orcas are cherished by Americans and Canadians alike,” says Christianne Wilhelmson, Georgia Strait Alliance’s Vancouver-based Program Coordinator. “Yet due to marine pollution, these whales are one of the most toxically contaminated marine mammals in the world. Industry, governments and conservation groups on both sides of the border should be working together to prevent pollution and to protect the orcas.”

EARTH’S VITAL SIGNS
According to Vital Signs 2006–2007, released in July by the Worldwatch Institute, economic indicators are on the rise with unprecedented levels of commerce and consumption, but these are set against a backdrop of ecological decline in a world powered overwhelmingly by fossil fuels. In 2005, the average atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration increased 0.6 percent over the high in 2004, representing the largest annual increase ever recorded. The average global temperature reached 14.6 degrees Celsius, making 2005 the warmest year ever recorded on the Earth’s surface.

The findings in Vital Signs 2006–2007 build on those of the United Nations-sponsored Millennium Ecosystem Assessment released in 2005, which notes that degradation of Earth’s natural systems has been brought about by human activity. For example, deforestation accounts for 25 percent of annual human-caused carbon emissions, and nearly 1 percent of the global forested area was lost between 2000 and 2005 (with the greatest losses posted in Africa and Latin America, at 3.2 percent and 2.5 percent respectively). The decline of ecosystems is undermining the vital services they provide, including the provision of fresh water and food and the regulation of climate and air quality. Ecosystem decline is also increasing the risk of disruptive and potentially irreversible changes such as regional climate shifts, the emergence of new diseases, and the formation of low-oxygen ‘dead zones’ in coastal waters.

As of late last year, an estimated 20 percent of the world’s coral reefs had been destroyed, as were 20 percent of mangrove forests in the last 25 years alone. Both can provide a natural buffer for coastlines against weather-related disasters, the cost of which hit a record $204 billion in 2005, with $125 billion of this caused by Hurricane Katrina.

“Business as usual is harming the Earth’s ecosystems and the people who depend on them,” said Erik Assadourian, Vital Signs 2006–2007 project director. “If everyone consumed at the average level of high-income countries, the planet could sustainably support only 1.8 billion people, not today’s population of 6.5 billion. Yet the world’s population is expected not to shrink but to grow to 8.9 billion by 2050.” For more, see www.worldwatch.org.

BIODIVERSITY CRISIS
Warning that Earth is on the verge of “a major biodiversity crisis,” 19 of the field’s most distinguished scientists and policy experts are calling for a new global coordinating mechanism to provide a united, authoritative scientific voice to inform government decision-making internationally.

And they are calling upon the wider scientific community and stakeholders to lend active support to a newly established consultation process designed to create just such an international organizing and unifying mechanism for science advice on biodiversity.

Published in the UK journal Nature (July 20 edition), leading experts from 13 nations— Canada, Chile, China, France, Germany, Ghana, India, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, South Africa, the USA and the UK—signed a blunt declaration saying it’s urgent that the gap between biodiversity science and public policy be closed and that the world’s science community must be far more strongly organized and integrated.

According to the group: “Virtually all aspects of biodiversity are in steep decline and a large number of populations and species are likely to become extinct in the present century. Despite this evidence, biodiversity is still consistently undervalued and given inadequate weight in both private and public decisions.”

They want to see the world’s science community speaking with a single authoritative voice akin to that of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Signatories include Robert Watson, Chief Scientist at the World Bank, who chairs or has chaired several global scientific collaborations including the IPCC, the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment and the Ozone Assessment Panel.

Friends of the Earth (UK) say that without reversing global warming, nearly 40% of land-based wildlife are doomed to extinction within our lifetimes. See www.foe.co.uk for what can be done.

ALLIANCE FOR PUGET SOUND SHORELINE
People For Puget Sound, the Trust for Public Land, and the Nature Conservancy recently formed the Alliance for Puget Sound Shorelines, a new partnership committed to working collaboratively to restore and protect Puget Sound’s nearshore environment.

The Alliance’s three-year goals are to to create 10 new parks and natural areas along the Puget Sound shoreline; to restore 100 miles of critical shoreline habitat through on-the-ground action; and to enhance protection of 1,000 miles of shoreline through improved policies.
The Alliance will partner with tribes, land trusts, local governments, citizen organizations, civic leaders, businesses, state and federal agencies and others interested in reconnecting people to the shoreline and restoring the shores and waters of Puget Sound.

The Director for the Alliance for Puget Sound Shorelines is John Daly. See People for Puget Sound’s website: www.pugetsound.org.

CALIFORNIA’S MARINE RESERVES
California is creating a large network of 29 marine reserves off the state’s coast, from Santa Barbara to Santa Cruz, in order to protect fisheries there, some of which have been depleted by as much as 95%. Most fishing will be banned over about 200 square miles of coastal waters.

WINNERS IN THE KAYAK KRAZY RAFFLE
The Grand prize Atlantis kayak in the Georgia Strait Alliance’s annual summer raffle goes to Colleen McEligott of North Vancouver. 2nd prize winner of a trip for two with Pacific Northwest Expeditions is Scott Prior of Qualicum Beach. 3rd prize winner of the West Marine inflatable double kayak is Dean Clark of Gabriola Island. GSA’s Amber Hieb, raffle coordinator, did a magnificent job raising $12,000 for GSA’s marine conservation work, up $1000 over last year. Amber and her team of volunteers attended 30 events in 14 communities, selling approximately 2300 tickets in only 16 weeks. She also organized and produced a radio ad campaign for GSA with air time donated by the Malaspina University-College FM radio station where she is a student. GSA thanks all the companies that donated the prizes, everyone who sold or bought tickets, and WaveLength Magazine for its help with promotion.

SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON SUSTAINABLE AQUACULTURE
In June the British Columbia government’s Special Committee on Sustainable Aquaculture (SCSA) began holding public hearings in 19 communities. The hearings, which will end in October, will play an important role in shaping the Committee’s recommendations for sustainable aquaculture. Based on input from the public, the Committee must present a report to the government no later than March 2007. You can make your views known to the Committee either by appearing before them in person or by sending a written submission by email, fax or mail. The Georgia Strait Alliance has developed an Information Kit for those preparing presentations to the Committee. It describes the problems with open netcage salmon farming and proposes straightforward, workable solutions. Click on ‘Fish Farm Hearings’ at www.GeorgiaStrait.org.

The deadline for submissions is October 31, 2006.
Send written submissions by fax: 250-356-8172; email: Aquaculture@leg.bc.ca; or by mail to: Craig James, Clerk Assistant and Clerk of Committees Room 224, Parliament Buildings Victoria BC, V8V 1X4.