Increasing protection: the high seas

Gap in the global protected seas system

WWF's Global Marine Programme has created a High Seas Initiative to increase international attention for the conservation of these vast expanses of ocean, which include both surface and deep-sea habitats. The initiative is also working to immediately protect high seas resources, many of which are under serious stress due to unregulated human activities.

At present, the world does not have a global legal framework to enable High Seas Marine Protected Areas or "high seas site-specific management regimes" to be established. In addition, while international agreements and conventions already govern some aspects of international waters, there is no single overarching legal framework that regulates all activities on the high seas.

Implementing such tools will therefore require new thinking and innovative approaches to test existing legal and technical frameworks, apply enforcement actions over large areas offshore, and to adapt management to changing threats.

Our work on High Seas protection includes:

• Action Plan for high seas MPAs: Together with IUCN-The World Conservation Union and the World Commission on Protected Areas (WCPA), WWF is developing 10-year action plan to deliver high seas MPAs. We are working to set up the international legal framework needed to allow high seas conservation, and developing pilot projects in places like the Grand Banks of Canada.
• Creating MPAs: Building international support for, and then implementing, high seas MPAs is a complex, long-term process.
• We have already helped to create, and now manage, the Ligurian Sea Cetacean Sanctuary in the Mediterranean - shared by France, Monaco, and Italy, and we are continuing to work towards other such MPAs in the Mediterranean.
• In the Northeast Atlantic Ocean, WWF has helped create the Portuguese Rainbow vent field as the first MPA on the extended continental shelf of a coastal state - and prepare the designation of a large part of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge as a first MPA beyond national jurisdiction.
• In addition, we are working with the Australian, French, and South African governments to create a network of MPAs around France’s Kerguelen Islands, South Africa's Prince Edward Islands, and Australia’s Heard Islands and McDonalds Islands MPA in the Southern Ocean, in order to improve fisheries management in remote ocean areas.
• Protection from industrial exploitation: WWF is also part of the global effort to immediately protect high seas resources and ecosystems threatened by industrial exploitation. For example:
  
  
  • WWF and industry groups from Australia, New Zealand, Namibia, and South Africa cooperatively derived a Vision Statement for high seas fisheries management for the Southern Ocean.
    
  • Pressure from WWF contributed to a ban in 2005 on bottom trawling in the Mediterranean Sea at depths below 1,000m, as well as a closure of more than 600,000 km² of the Northeast Atlantic to bottom fishing, both of which will help protect high seas areas.
    
  • We are encouraging the extension of existing international legal regimes and agreements - including codes of conduct, best practices, and voluntary guidelines - to also cover the use of high seas resources.
    
  • Together with several government ministers and IUCN, WWF was a member of a now disbanded  Task Force hosted by the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) that has issued recommendations for reducing illegal, unregulated, and unreported (IUU) fishing on the high seas.
    
  • WWF and other NGOs are calling for a temporary moratorium on bottom trawling - one of the most damaging fishing methods - on seamounts and deep-sea cold-water corals, until their protection can be secured.
    
  • WWF and other NGOs are urging the UN to close the loopholes in maritime law that allow sub-standard ships and shipping practices to continue on the high seas, and encouraging the new UN Task Force on Flags of Convenience to increase the transparency of flag state responsibilities.
    
  • WWF has signed an agreement with Wallenius Wilhelmsen Logistics, one of the world's shipping leaders, to promote conservation of the high seas.

   

• Raising awareness: We are also working to increase international attention for high seas conservation. For example, we called for an increased focus on the management and conservation of the high seas at the 2003 UN Informal Open-ended Consultative Process on the Law of the Sea (UNICPOLOS) meeting.
  
  We also played a major role in developing a recommendation on High Seas conservation and management at the 2003 World Parks Congress.
  
  These have since led to a recommendation for at least five high seas MPAs to be developed by 2008. WWF is also actively working to ensure that high seas conservation is included in the agendas of relevant international fora, such as the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).