Cook Island Marine Park, Protecting and Sustaining Ocean Life

Conserving natural resources is a difficult task when there is a high demand and low supply.  Currently sixty percent of the world's fisheries are collapsed or fully fished.  It is hard to justify not fishing an area that still has fish, but allowing ocean ecosystems the chance to recover is the only way to ensure that our oceans have a future.

Kiribati, a small island nation in the Pacific, shocked the world when they created the Phoenix Islands Protected Area in 2006.  Then in 2008, they went even farther by more than doubled the area protected to 408,250 square kilometers, which is larger than the state of California.  Kiribati was one small nation providing an example, but now the Pacific Oceanscape, a group of 15 nations that controls approximately ten percent of the ocean's surface waters, is planning a large conservation project of their own.

The proposed Cook Island Marine Park would be a 1.2 million square kilometer area, which is an area larger than Texas, and is being cooperatively planned by scientists, local leaders, and local fishermen.  The goal is to create a park that has tourism, low fishing, and commercial fishing zones to provide multiple functions while managing the ocean ecosystems sustainably.  Although the park will still be used for fishing, the combined effort of the Pacific Oceanscape is a victory for sustainability because there will be collaborative management that will use the different ecosystems within the park for their most suitable use.

Coordinated conservation efforts are important for the survival of the world's oceans.  Hopefully we see more efforts like those of Kiribati and the Pacific Oceanscape in the future.

There is a great video that goes farther into this topic.  It is really short, and I encourage you to check it out by clicking on this link: How 15 Island Nations are Changing Ocean Conservation .

Cheers,
Vicki Simonsen