More evidence for the need for marine protected areas
As many of you will know WDCS is working with Team Russia who are competing in the Volvo Ocean Race to raise awareness of the need for more marine protected areas. WDCS is campaigning for the creation of significant new protected places for whales and dolphins around the world by 2012. These safe havens would protect critical habitat for vulnerable and endangered populations in all the oceans of the world, from the mangrove forests favoured by tropical dolphins in the Bay of Bengal to the big whale feeding grounds in Antarctica’s Ross Sea.
If we need any further reasons of why such areas are necessary, Richard Blacks article for the BBC entitled Slow Progress on Ocean Protection. Richard reports that, 'Less than 1% of the world's oceans have been given protected status, according to a major survey. Governments have committed to a target of protecting 10% by 2012, which the authors of the new report say there is no chance of
meeting'.
WDCS is committed to helping those Governments to be able to enact marine protection for their whales and dolphins. We shall be reporting from the forthcoming Conference of the Parties of the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS) in early December on progress on this campaign.
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