Australia is among the first countries in the world to sign a landmark international treaty that aims to protect biodiversity in oceans that lie outside national borders.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong signed the treaty at the UN General Assembly in New York on Thursday, calling it a “historic global treaty”.
The High Seas Treaty establishes a global framework to legally safeguard two-thirds of the world’s oceans which until now have been largely unprotected from exploitation. The treaty also enforces better management of global fisheries and will tackle pollution.
“Australia has today signed a historic global treaty to protect the world’s ocean,” Wong said. “We have worked alongside our Pacific partners to make this treaty a reality – safeguarding our Blue Pacific for future generations.
“Australia is working to ratify the treaty and bring it into force as soon as possible.”
Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek said the treaty will lead to stronger ocean protections on a global scale.
“The High Seas cover 60 per cent of the world’s surface and only about one per cent of these oceans are currently protected,” Plibersek said.
“International cooperation to protect and manage them is crucial. This treaty will enable us to meet our global goal of protecting 30 per cent of our earth’s oceans.”
CEO of Greenpeace David Ritter has welcomed Australia’s commitment to the treaty, but also said the government’s continual expansion of fossil fuel projects is incompatible with a healthy marine environment.
“While the Australian Government must be applauded for this historic decision, it must also act in line with the irrefutable science that fossil fuels are driving the climate crisis, which is having severe consequences on marine environments in Australia and the Pacific,” he said.
“This week, the Bureau of Meteorology officially declared an El Niño weather event for Australia, meaning a summer of brutal heatwaves and extreme weather looms. Just weeks into Spring, we’ve already seen ‘off-the-scale’ ocean temperatures recorded in the Tasman Sea, and the threat of another mass coral bleaching event on the Great Barrier Reef looks increasingly likely.
“The expansion of the fossil fuel industry is incompatible with a healthy marine environment. We urge Minister Plibersek to recognise the enormous threat that projects like Woodside’s Burrup Hub pose to our oceans and to knock back this disastrous proposal.”
Since its election last year, the Albanese government has approved multiple fossil fuel projects.
Environment Minister Plibersek recently teamed up with two coal companies in federal court to fight an environmental group over the climate risk assessments of two new coal mines. The Environment Council of Central Queensland has urged Plibersek to review the assessment of pending coal and gas projects under the EPBC Act.
President of the Environment Centre of Central Queensland, Christine Carlisle said: “We’re doing this because we’re so tired of the sound bites. So tired of photos of ministers posing with koalas, saying all the right things but failing to act.”
“The minister’s decision to refuse to act on the climate science is not only, we argue, legally wrong, but feels like a betrayal to the Australians who voted in favour of climate action,” Carlisle said.
“This is now a matter for the courts. We hope not just to win these cases, but to set a precedent that all new coal and gas projects must be properly assessed for their climate risk to our environment.”