First it was Russia and Canada racing for a lucrative slice of the underwater Arctic. Now, according to Saturday’s Guardian, Britain is setting the pace in the hunt for new oil and minerals elsewhere.
Diplomats are preparing to lay claim to valuable natural resources on and beyond continental shelves outside of existing territorial zones around the Falklands, Ascension Island, also in the South Atlantic, and tiny Rockall, which is west of the Hebrides. To assert new rights to underwater wealth, countries must lodge claims with the UN by May 2009. At stake, as a result of land scrambles worldwide, could be 2.7 million miles of ocean floor. The value of underwater treasure is said to be immense, particularly given the finite oil left in known reserves. But what of the treasures above the sea, not least albatrosses and other seabirds being killed daily by longline fishing ships in waters around the Falklands. The Falklands hosts the largest colony – about 380,000 pairs - of breeding albatrosses in the world, and whilst only one of the 22 albatross species nests on the Falklands, the UK bears considerable responsibility for the future of this bird. Currently, one albatross is killed by longlining methods every five minutes, attracted onto baited hooks on or just below the sea's surface then drowned. These birds usually mate with only one partner so if one of the pair is killed, two birds, not one, are knocked out of the reproduction cycle. And albatrosses in the South Atlantic are declining faster than anywhere else in the world. The RSPB is running a campaign to help the captains of longline ships reduce their seabird by-catch. There are simple measures captains can take which do not affect their haul. We must do all we can to save these birds made famous by Coleridge’s Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner. While Britain’s diplomats strive to be first to the wealth beneath the sea, they should not turn away from the riches in the skies above.
Click here for the Guardian’s report
And here for the RSPB’s Save the Albatross campaign