WDC Blog - From the Front Line

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Kangaroo Island is a magical area where sperm whales dive for squid, sea lions forage and hunt and rock lobsters thrive. The mighty blue whale travels from afar every year to feed in these rich waters, but the petroleum industry is attempting to open this precious area as a new frontier for oil and gas. Without your voice saying NO to these plans, this critical habitat will be destroyed and the animals who depend on it will suffer.







For more of a birds-eye (or dolphins-eye) view of the area, watch this lovely video here.

Collectively, across all the different international petitions, protests and emails we have already generated nearly 20,000 signatures. Let’s make it 30,000, before our comment window closes on Monday 18th March. Please tell the Australian Environment Minister to reject this proposal!

In Bangkok, Thailand a joint Russian and US proposal to protect polar bears from international trade has failed.

In no short measure this is thanks to the EU failing to vote in favour. Indeed, the EU's fumbles at trying to achieve a compromise that pandered to Denmark and its Greenlanders (who don't export polar bears, but want their friends in Canada to be able to do so) demonstrates how the the views of some 50,000 people in Greenland have outweighed the majority of hundreds of millions in the rest of Europe. Maybe some other EU member states were also not convinced, but the lack of transparency in the EU's decision making makes it almost impossible for us to know.

Noting how Denmark has sought to bludgeon the EU in the whaling debate, we can only suspect at this stage.

The World Conservation Union (IUCN) has been reported to say that the polar bear population will decline some 30% over the next 45 years, but CITES appears to have a generic guidance that says the projected decline needs to be more than 50% over three generations – 45 years in the polar bear case, before action can take place.

The problem with such large long lived mammal species, is that, in a world where we are losing Arctic ice at the same time, will there be enough habitat to allow for recovery when polar bears have passed the 'magic' 50% figure?

You can read how Canada, Denmark and unfortunately even a 'conservation' group, helped keep polar bears in trouble in the Guardian's coverage of the ongoing CITES meeting.

WDC has one question to the EU and that is what will it do now as its compromise proposal failed? Do they just walk away or are they working to get something achieved?

If they do, then lets please ensure that Denmark cannot vote internally to force other EU countries into an abstention. If Poland, the UK, Germany and others want to vote for better polar bear conservation lets get on and do it. The ambiguous procedural rules of the Lisbon Treaty are now becoming a mill store around the EU's neck when the EU was meant to be able to take action.

Advocate General Maduro in Case C-246/07 Commission v Sweden strongly supports the freedom of EU member countries to insist action in this type of issue.

the Advocate General states;
‘…The distribution of competences operated by the Treaty is biased towards action: neither Member States nor the Community can block the other from pursuing a higher level of protection of the environment.’

At 57 the Advocate General states;
‘I am sympathetic to the argument that Member States must not be caught in a never-ending process, in which a final decision by the Community is postponed to the point of inaction. If that proves to be the case, a decision should be deemed to have been taken and Member States should be allowed to act’.

Whilst the US and the Russian Federation have managed to agree that the polar bear deserves the protection of banning trade at this years CITES meeting in Bangkok, Thailand, it appears that Denmark and Greenland alongside Canada are determined to ensure that the polar bear is not protected come hell or high water.

Yes, polar bears are threatened by climate change and rising seas, but they are also significantly threatened by increasing hunting and trade. It is estimated that only 20–25,000 polar bears now remain in the world and 15,000 of those live in Canada, where they are increasingly hunted for their skins and other parts as well as simply for sport.

The EU, with its 27 votes at the CITES conference, has the duty to help protect this key species. But it appears that the EU has put forward a compromise proposal that would keep polar bears off the necessary Appendix I and would effectively put off the discussion about what to do.

This proposal is not what many EU governments promised or what the EU Parliament voted for,  - and indeed may compromise the EU completely.

As some of you would know form these blogs WDC has been challenging the EU to clarify its voting procedures at these major environmental conventions. In a previous CITES meeting the EU Commission attempted to arm-wrestle pro-conservation countries into taking a weaker stance on a proposal to protect bluefin tuna.

On that occasion the EU put forward a compromise proposal but it was subsequently defeated, but the Commission then forbid any EU member state from voting for the original stricter proposal and instructed member states to abstain. There was even rumours of discussions in back rooms of fining countries that actually stood up and voted for protection.

Now we find ourselves in the potentially the same position.

The EU has put forward a compromise on the polar bear, but what if it loses that vote? Will the EU tell Germany, the UK, and other EU Member states that they can not vote with the USA and Russia for effective protection?

The EU has been gutted in the IWC by Denmark acting for Greenland in the past, lets just hope to goodness that this is not the case again.

EU member states should reject the compromise, but if they don't, then they should have the right to uphold EU law and vote for what they know is right.

Its time for this Denmark induced nightmare to end.

You can read more on this unfolding story on the Guardian newspaper website

You can read more on Denmark and the issue of the EU and whaling here

Our colleague Vanessa Williams-Grey is in Sri Lanka for Whale and Dolphin Conservation helping the people of Sri Lanka establish responsible whale watching. All photos courtesy Andrew Sutton.

She writes from the field from what sounds like a stunning part of the world.

Engaging with the whale watch community at Mirissa, Sri Lanka
Believe me, I’m as surprised as anyone to find myself writing about blue whales from what can only be described as possibly the best ‘outdoor office’ in the world. I’ve rigged up my laptop so that I can sit, swinging precariously - and thus typing equally precariously - from a hammock slung between two palm trees, barely metres from the ocean. My ears are full of the sound of waves crashing and the guttural squarks of birds flying from tree to tree. It’s green here, very green, and each evening, the air is heady with the scent of frangipani, whilst at dawn, stilt fishermen take up their positions perched atop impossibly flimsy-looking wooden poles in the ocean outside our villa.

Welcome to Mirissa, southern Sri Lanka. We are staying for a week as guests of Sri Lankan Airlines and their tourism partners, Jetwing Hotels and John Keells Group, as we embark on a joint project to engage with the local whale watching community and – hopefully – work together to make whale watching here as good as it possibly can be.  Because, despite appearances, all has not been entirely well in Paradise.

Continue reading "Best for blues?"

On Sunday March 3rd, thousands of people, including delegates representing 178 countries, convened in Bangkok, for the 16th meeting of the Conference of Parties (or ‘COP’) of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

WDC has a small team at the meeting and on the agenda are issues that will affect the lives and conservation of many animals; amongst these are a little-known large marine mammal from the west coast of Africa, the polar bear and a number of sharks and rays.

We have invited Mark Peter Simmonds to introduce the issues for us.

Continue reading "CITES - No whales this year, but other marine mammals under pressure"