Environment Minister attends UN Ocean summit in France

ABC NEWS (Australia)

A United Nations conference in France is aiming to bring more of the world's oceans under protection from the pressures of fishing and other industrial activities. Australia's Environment Minister Murray Watt is among those attending and he's pledged to step up the protection of marine areas.

Transcript

00:00Well, Australia is one of a number of countries that have signed up to this global pledge

00:06of trying to protect 30% of land areas and 30% of ocean areas by 2030.

00:13And so each country at this conference is trying to work towards that aim within their

00:18own territorial waters.

00:20Now for Australia, we're definitely one of the countries that is very advanced in this.

00:24We have more than half of the ocean that falls under our exclusive economic zone in some

00:29level of protection.

00:30What we really want to see is 30% in a highly protected zonal area.

00:36And the government's getting fairly close towards that.

00:39It has certainly expanded the highly protected areas around a lot of the sub-Antarctic islands,

00:45for example, like Macquarie Island, Heard Island and Macdonald Islands.

00:49They're also doing a review of some of the marine protected areas closer to the coastlines

00:54of eastern and western Australia to try and look at areas where they might be able to

00:59increase protection there.

01:00But really, we have the Australian government committed to reaching that 30% highly protected

01:06and well ahead of a number of other countries.

01:08And Murray Watt is speaking at this conference in Nice's reaffirmed Australian government commitment

01:14to reaching that target.

01:15And how much progress has there been internationally?

01:18Look, there's definitely momentum.

01:20Many of the participants, both government and non-government organisations who are taking

01:24part in this conference say that in the last year or two, there's been a lot of momentum

01:28towards trying to bring about real change to get to this point of better protection of

01:33ocean spaces.

01:34But one of the real stumbling blocks is the fact that most of the ocean territory, two thirds

01:39of it, is international waters.

01:40They're not under the legal control of any one country.

01:45So, what they've been working towards is trying to get enough countries to sign up to a treaty

01:49that's being called variously the Global Oceans Treaty or the High Seas Treaty, given a couple

01:54of different names, because its real name is a very long UN-like name.

01:58But the idea is, if 60 countries can ratify this treaty, it would allow nations to put forward

02:03proposals to give protection to international waters to preserve those areas from pressures

02:11like fishing, deep sea mining, seabed trawling, other extractive industries.

02:17And that would be a big change.

02:18Now, we need 60 countries to ratify this.

02:22Australia hasn't ratified it yet, but Murray Watt, the Environment Minister, has made a commitment

02:27while he's been over at this conference, saying that the government will bring forward legislation

02:32to ratify it later on this year.

02:34So, that certainly adds to a bit of international momentum to try to make sure that this treaty

02:39becomes reality.

02:41And what practical difference would a High Seas Treaty make?

02:45Well, to give an example of how it might work, there are international waters between

02:50Australia and New Zealand that are beyond the exclusive economic zones of both countries,

02:55countries, but sit between the two.

02:57And parts of these waters in the Tasman Sea are very heavily fished for tuna and other

03:04pelagic fish.

03:05But there are also some really delicate biological areas where there are a lot of endangered

03:10sea turtles, a lot of albatross are affected.

03:12You know, they're endangered species too, and they're often bycatchers of these tuna fisheries.

03:17So, Australia and New Zealand could put forward a proposal under this treaty and say,

03:20we want to make this an internationally marine protected area.

03:23And if at least three quarters of the signatories agree, then that could ensure that those areas

03:30are marine protected areas and international waters.

03:33So, that's a bit of a long way off.

03:35There have to be enough countries to sign the treaty, and then there have to be enough treaty

03:38countries agree to an international area being protected.

03:42But at the moment, there's no legal framework for being able to look after or protect ocean

03:47areas and international waters, and this potentially could do that, and that could have pretty

03:51significant consequences in the seas around Australia and around the Pacific.

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