Marine Biodiversity of Aotearoa New Zealand

Cold Water Coral By-Catch from Bottom Trawling off New Zealand

The Census of Marine Life's results on Marine Biodiversity in New Zealand are published in the Public Library of Science's One Journal of 2 August 2010 here.

The Census recorded some 17,135 living species within New Zealand's 200 nautical-mile boundary of the Exclusive Economic Zone or EEZ. This diversity includes 4,315 known undescribed species in scientific collections. Total marine diversity in the EEZ is expected to equal that in the ERMS or European Register of Marine Species region despite  the European region being 5.5 times larger than New Zealand's EEZ, indicating New Zealand's marine diversity is much greater than that in the European region.

The threats to New Zealand's marine biodiversity are several, including fishing, mining, chemical pollution, coastal nutrient and sediment input, habitat loss, aquaculture, invasive species, harmful algal blooms, and climate change.

 Protected areas within New Zealand's EEZ

"Currently, there are more than 30 marine protected areas established in New Zealand waters. All are “no take” areas, administered by the Department of Conservation....They range in size from about 250 ha (within a harbor) to 745,000 ha (7,450 km²) (at the Kermadec Islands). Collectively, they protect 7.6% of New Zealand's territorial sea; however, 99% of this area is in two marine reserves around isolated offshore island groups (Auckland and Kermadec), and the sum of the areas of the remaining reserves in the mainland territorial sea is less than the area of the smallest terrestrial national park. Of New Zealand's total marine environment (EEZ), just 0.3% is protected in marine reserves. Currently the highest level of protection outside the territorial sea is through fisheries closures of trawling on 19 seamounts, initiated in 2001. Additionally, in 2007, the New Zealand government established 17 Benthic Protection Areas in deep water; these protect about 30% of the seabed in the EEZ from deep-sea bottom trawling and dredging activity. There are three marine parks, each having different regulations and generally affording a lower level of protection than marine reserves proper, for example, mainly protecting reef fish."

Much clearly remains to be done to manage the marine environment in a sustainable manner.

For our Australian friends and readers of this blog, you will find a similar Marine Biodiversity of Australia article compiled as part of the Census of Marine Life here.

Census of Marine Life

Orange roughy, at risk in New Zealand waters

Over the past ten years, more than 2,700 scientists from 82 nations involving 538 field expeditions backed by US$650 million of funding have been conducting a census of global marine life. Now the results are becoming available in final form.

In October the Census of Marine Life will publish more detailed, final results but advance estimates have recently become available. The research has so far counted over 230,000 individual species.

The Guardian Weekly sums up the Census results nicely (full article here):  

"The results show that around a fifth of the world's marine species are crustaceans such as crabs, lobsters, krill and barnacles. Add in molluscs (squid and octopus) and fish (including sharks) and that accounts for up to half of the number of species in the world's seas. The charismatic species often used in conservation campaigning – whales, sea lions, turtles and sea birds – account for less than 2% of the species in the world's oceans. 

The surveys have also highlighted major areas of concern for conservationists. "In every region, they've got the same story of a major collapse of what were usually very abundant fish stocks or crabs or crustaceans that are now only 5-10% of what they used to be," said Mark Costello of the Leigh Marine Laboratory, University of Auckland in New Zealand. "These are largely due to over-harvesting and poor management of those fisheries. That's probably the biggest and most consistent threat to marine biodiversity around the world."

The main threats to date include overfishing, degraded habitats, pollution and the arrival of invasive species. But more problems are around the corner: rising water temperatures and acidification thanks to climate change and the growth in areas of the ocean that are low in oxygen and, therefore, unable to support life."

The Guardian UK also has some very useful graphics providing more detailed information on various ecosystems and regions of the world here and a brief item on just how the census takers count marine species and how they estimate species yet to be discovered here.

 The advance results of the Census were published in the 2 August issue of the Public Library of Sciences ONE Journal available here.

Both New Zealand and Australia have huge marine resources surrounding their coastlines and have equally huge tasks ahead of them in managing those resources in more sustainable ways. Better management requires better knowledge and the Census of Marine Life is an important improvement in that knowledge base.

 Hoki, at risk in New Zealand waters

Christchurch City Council Belt-Tightening?

With the economy in recession now for over a year and the prospect of the increased expense of moving into a renovated postal warehouse as its new Christchurch Civic Centre at an annual rent of $8.2 million, the Christchurch City Council is rumoured to be considering its options to restore fiscal balance.

To that end, we wonder if there might be any advantage to the CCC ordering up from storage its electric truck fleet from the early 1920s which would have the added advantage of enabling the Council to meet its greenhouse gas emissions reductions...

photographer, Samuel Heath Head. Alexander Turnbull Library.
click on photo for larger image

... otherwise it's shank's pony for council employees and ratepayers.

RMA Resource Management Act Reform

The National government has announced plans to streamline the Resource Management Act to achieve efficiency gains in the resource consent process.

Minister for the Environment, Nick Smith, identified key elements of the reform package as:

• Removing frivolous, vexatious and anti-competitive objections
• Streamlining processes for projects of national significance
• Creating an Environmental Protection Authority
• Improving plan development and plan change processes
• Improving resource consent processes
• Streamlining decision making
• Improving workability and compliance
• Improving national instruments

The Government has backed off its election promise to remove references to the Treaty of Waitangi in the legislation because of opposition by the Maori Party - which is in a confidence and supply agreement with National - as well as claiming such removal was no longer needed because of existing case law and improved practices.

An Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) will be created to achieve national environmental goals. The government will use this agency to get around the appeals process to the Environment Court for proposals of "national significance".

An EPA board of inquiry will be the vehicle for fast-tracking these nationally significant projects so that board decisions are made within a 9 month time frame. The effect for major projects will be that the EPA board process will re-centralise decision-making, effectively removing local authority decision-making over such projects and subjecting decisions to more political interference at the level of national government.

As emphasized in earlier posts on the RMA, the late Robert Muldoon, Prime Minister of the National government in the last 1970s-early 1980s, can be heard cackling from the grave that his late 1970s fast track proposal to bulldoze through projects despite environmental issues is about to come to fruition.

While some environmental organisations such as the Environmental Defence Society (EDS), concede the need to improve the speed of the appeals process, they point to the narrowing of appeals to points of law as a mischaracterisation of the role of the Environment Court as a judicial tribunal rather than its true function as an expert tribunal.

More fundamentally, environmental groups such as the EDS and Greenpeace are concerned that the proposed RMA changes, yet to be enacted, effectively strengthen the hand of large developers and undermine public participation and environmental sustainability. With the RMA's fundamental principle of a "balancing test" that is readily interpreted to weigh more heavily in favour of commercial over environmental interests it is hard not to be persuaded that the revised RMA will result in a backsliding in New Zealand's efforts to move towards environmental sustainability.

Kakapo Recovers from Lead Poisoning

Lee, a male kakapo (the world's only flightless parrot species), has responded to treatment for lead poisoning at the Auckland Zoo’s New Zealand Centre for Conservation Medicine (NZCCM).

Transferred in April from Codfish Island, off Stewart Island, to Anchor Island in Fiordland, Lee was discovered to have lost a kilogram of weight by August, dropping his weight to 1.2 kg. He was then removed to Auckland Zoo for emergency treatment. Blood tests established that Lee had lead poisoning and treatment was commenced to remove the lead from his system by use of calcium compounds. The lead poisoning may have resulted from a fishing sinker or shotgun pellets in the environment.

Lee is now up to 1.7 kg bodyweight and will be returned to Codfish Island, his home of 25 years, instead of Anchor Island.

Lee is one of only 91 known kakapo in the world.