Ice Cream Dollars Could Purchase Ocean Protection

WASHINGTON, DC, June 15, 2004 (ENS) - For less than half of what Americans and Europeans together spend on ice cream each year, the world could establish a global network of marine parks, essential for restoring the health of the oceans and sustaining fishing industries, a study by World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds has found.

The marine parks would cost the global community some $12 to 14 billion per year, according to the study, published Monday in the "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."

Americans spend an estimated $20 billion on ice cream each year, while Europeans spend $11 billion, according to "State of the World 2004," an annual report published by the Worldwatch Institute.

"Instead of spending billions on luxury items, let's rescue our seas," said Dr. Andrew Balmford, researcher at the University of Cambridge and lead author of the study, "Worldwide Costs of Marine Protected Areas."

Gulf of Aqaba, Red Sea (Photo by Mohammed Al Momany courtesy NOAA)

Fish populations have fallen to 10 percent or less of what their numbers were at the onset of commercial fishing.

"An ambitious marine park program could be instituted for less than the $15 to $30 billion already spent each year on economically and environmentally damaging subsidies to commercial fisheries," the study's authors wrote.

Subsidies support excess capacity in fisheries that provides short-term job security for fishers, but carries long-term costs and risks to the survival of fish species.

"The estimated cost of creating these parks does not factor in expected gains from protected areas to fisheries," said co-author and professor at the University of York, Callum Roberts.

"Marine parks promote the recovery of fish stocks within their borders and export fish and their offspring into fishing grounds," said Roberts. "Well-managed parks have often doubled catches in surrounding fisheries.

"Even a 20 percent catch enhancement arising from the global park system, a conservative estimate, would pay for management costs," he argued.

The authors of the study surveyed the running costs of 83 well managed marine parks worldwide. Annual spending varied from a few dollars to $72 million per square mile per year.

The study estimated the running costs of a global system of marine parks that would protect 20 to 30 percent of the world's seas. The authors took these figures from the recommendation of the World Parks Congress in 2003 that, to restore marine ecosystems and rebuild fish stocks, at least 20 to 30 percent of every marine habitat must be protected from fishing.

"With fisheries in steep decline, and with rates of habitat loss now equal or exceeding that of rainforests," the authors maintain, "this connect-the-dots design for marine protected areas would create between 830,000 and 1.1 million full time jobs and fortify fragile marine ecosystems in the process."

Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary (Photo courtesy NOAA)

Still, costs could run double those figures if ideal conservation management standards are to be achieved. The parks surveyed for this study said their present income only accounted for half the amount needed to reach the ideal.

The authors found that costs were higher for marine parks that are smaller, closer to coasts, and in developed countries.

At the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002, coastal nations pledged to turn the tide on this decline by creating national networks of marine parks by 2012. "But until now, it has been unclear how much it will cost countries to deliver on their promises," said Scott Burns, director of WWF's Marine Conservation program.

"Making this commitment to marine protection will require international effort on an unprecedented scale," said Burns. "Just half a percent of the sea lies within marine parks today, compared to 12 percent of the land."