Seabirds spend nearly 40% of time beyond national borders, study finds

The Waved Albatross' impressive wingspan helps is roam thousands of miles

© Mike's Birds

From BirdLife by  Jessica Law

Scientists have found that albatrosses and large petrels spend 39% of their time on the high seas – areas of ocean where no single country has jurisdiction.

How can we make sure these vital habitats don’t fall through the cracks?

When we think of the high seas, images of swashbuckling pirates setting course to distant horizons often spring to mind. During the Golden Age of piracy, these lawless buccaneers were considered ‘hostis humani generis’ – enemies of all humankind – meaning that any country had the right to seize a pirate ship in international waters.

Today, there’s increasing evidence that we may need to take a similar approach when conserving marine life, but in a more positive sense – seeing it as a universal responsibility that nations must work together to safeguard.

One such piece of evidence came to light today, when a new study revealed that albatrosses, and their close cousins the large petrels, spend 39% of their time in oceans beyond national jurisdiction.

Using tracking data from 5,775 birds across 39 species, researchers found that all species regularly cross into the waters of other countries, meaning that no single nation can adequately ensure their conservation.

Furthermore, all species depended on the high seas: international waters that cover half of the world’s oceans and a third of the earth’s surface.

This is particularly worrying because albatrosses and large petrels are among the world’s most-threatened animals, with over half of the species at risk of extinction.

At sea they face numerous dangers including injury and mortality from fishing gear, pollution and loss of their natural prey due to overfishing and climate change.

According to co-author Maria Dias, from BirdLife International: “Negative interactions with fisheries are particularly serious in international waters because there is less monitoring of industry practices and compliance with regulations. Also, beyond fish there is currently no global legal framework for addressing the conservation of biodiversity in the high seas.”

For example, the Amsterdam Albatross Diomedea amsterdamensis (Endangered) spends 47% of its time in international waters in the Indian Ocean.

Although it benefits from strong protection at its breeding colony on Amsterdam Island (one of the French Southern Territories), its conservation at sea is much more challenging.

When roaming the seas in search of squid prey, the <100 remaining adults use a vast area stretching from South Africa to Australia – requiring international coordination to minimize the risk of death in fishing gear.

 

 

The Amsterdam Albatross is currently only protected at its breeding grounds

© Vincent Legendre

Hope is on the horizon.

The international scale of this study is itself a perfect example how seabirds can connect nations. Uniting researchers from 16 countries, who agreed to share their data through BirdLife’s Seabird Tracking Database, this global collaboration couldn’t have come at a more important time: the United Nations are currently discussing a global treaty for the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity in international waters.

“Our study unequivocally shows that albatrosses and large petrels need reliable protection that extends beyond the borders of any single country,” says Martin Beal, lead author of the study at the Marine and Environmental Sciences Centre at ISPA - Instituto Universitário in Lisbon, Portugal. 

“This treaty represents a massive opportunity for countries to commit to protecting species wherever they may roam.”

Legal measures up for discussion under the treaty, such as introducing environmental impact assessments for industrial activities in the high seas, have the potential to significantly reduce pressure on species that call these oceans home.

Carolina Hazin, Marine Policy Coordinator for BirdLife, sees the study as part of an even bigger picture. 

“No conservation of migratory species can be effective if fragmented in terms of space, time and activity. This study reinforces the urgency that the United Nations adopt the high seas treaty, which in turn will contribute to the Convention on Biological Diversity’s ambitious global framework to protect all nature over the next decades.”

The old saying “out of sight, out of mind” didn’t work for the pirates of the Golden Age.

And as the swashbuckling explorers of the animal world, it shouldn’t apply to seabirds either.

 

Links :

• Stuff : 'Lawless' high seas undoing New Zealand's seabird conservation efforts
• The Guardian : Lava, floating rocks and the Blob: the mystery behind the deaths of millions of seabirds
• NHM : Hundreds of thousands of pieces of plastic are brought back onto land by seabirds 

Everything you need to know about the plan to release treated Fukushima water

The storage tanks for treated water at the tsunami-crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant.

They will be full by the second half of 2022.

Photograph: Kyodo/Reuters

From The Guardian by AFP

Japan has announced it will dump 1m tonnes of contaminated water into the ocean, sparking controversy

Japan’s decision to release more than 1m tonnes of treated radioactive water from the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea has sparked controversy inside and outside the country.

Here are some questions and answers about the plan, which is expected to take decades to complete.

 

 

What is the processed water?

Since the 2011 nuclear disaster, radioactive water has accumulated at the plant, including liquid used for cooling, and rain and groundwater that has seeped in.

An extensive pumping and filtration system known as Alps (advanced liquid processing system) extracts tonnes of newly contaminated water each day and filters out most radioactive elements.

The plant operator, Tepco, has built more than 1,000 tanks to hold some 1.25m tonnes of processed water at the site but they will be full by the second half of 2022.

The Alps process removes most of the radioactive isotopes to levels below international safety guidelines for nuclear plant waste water.

But it cannot remove some, including tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen that experts say is only harmful to humans in very large doses.

The half-life of tritium – the time needed for one half the atoms of a radioactive isotope to decay – is 12.3 years.

In humans, it has an estimated biological half-life of seven to 10 days.

How will it be released?

Japan’s government has backed a plan to dilute the processed water and release it into the sea.

The government says the process meets international standards, and it has been endorsed by the International Atomic Energy Agency.
“Releasing into the ocean is done elsewhere,” IAEA’s director general, Rafael Mariano Grossi, has said. “It’s not something new. There is no scandal here.”

The release is not likely to begin for at least two years and will take decades.

A government spokesman, Katsunobo Kato, said the dilution would reduce tritium levels to well below standards set domestically and by the World Health Organization for drinking water, with IAEA supervision.

 

 

Why is it controversial?

Environmental groups like Greenpeace, which opposes nuclear power, say radioactive materials like carbon-14 that remain in the water can “be easily concentrated in the food chain”.

They allege that accumulated doses over time could damage DNA, and want to see the water stored until technology is developed to improve filtration.

Local fishing communities worry that years of work to convince consumers that Fukushima’s seafood is safe will be wiped out by the release.

“The message from the government that the water is safe is not reaching the public, that’s the huge problem,” an official with the association of Fukushima fishermen unions told Agence France-Presse.

He said trading partners had warned they would stop selling their products and consumers had said they would stop eating Fukushima seafood if the water were released: “Our efforts in the past decade to restore the fish industry will be for nothing.”

What about Fukushima seafood?

The government says radioactive elements in the water are far below international standards, pointing out that waste water is regularly discharged from nuclear plants elsewhere.

Even releasing all the stored water in a single year would produce “no more than one-thousandth the exposure impact of natural radiation in Japan,” the foreign ministry said in a reply to a UN report.

For food, Japan nationally sets a standard of no more than 100 becquerels of radioactivity per kilogram (Bq/kg), compared with 1,250 Bq/kg in the EU and 1,200 in the US.

But for Fukushima produce, the level is set even lower, at just 50 Bq/kg, in an attempt to win consumer trust. Hundreds of thousands of food items have been tested in the region since 2011.

What do scientists say?

Michiaki Kai, an expert on radiation risk assessment at Japan’s Oita University of Nursing and Health Sciences, said it was important to control the dilution and volume of released water.
But “there is consensus among scientists that the impact on health is minuscule”, he told AFP.
Still, “it can’t be said the risk is zero, which is what causes controversy”.

Geraldine Thomas, chair of molecular pathology at Imperial College London and an expert on radiation, said tritium “does not pose a health risk at all – and particularly so when you factor in the dilution factor of the Pacific Ocean”.
She said carbon-14 was also not a health risk, arguing that chemical contaminants in seawater like mercury should concern consumers more “than anything that comes from the Fukushima site”.
On eating Fukushima seafood, “I would have no hesitation whatsoever,” she added.

 

Links :

• The Guardian : Fukushima: Japan announces it will dump contaminated water into sea 
• NYTimes : Fukushima Wastewater Will Be Released Into the Ocean, Japan Says
• DailyMail : Japan says it will begin releasing treated radioactive water from Fukushima into the Pacific Ocean in two years – sparking anger in China and South Korea
• NYTimes : Japan’s Plan for Fukushima Wastewater Meets a Wall of Mistrust in Asia
• Reuters : Countries react to Japan's plans to release Fukushima water into ocean 
• GeoGarage blog : Fukushima fishermen concerned for future ...

China turning South China Sea supply ships into mobile surveillance bases

The Sansha 1 supply ship participating in a joint rescue exercise with Chinese maritime law enforcement vessels in June 2017 in the Paracel Islands.

From RFA by Zachary Haver

China is upgrading two of its civilian South China Sea supply ships with new high-tech surveillance equipment to help the vessels track ships from the United States, Vietnam, and other foreign countries, new Chinese government procurement documents show.

This is just the latest instance of the Chinese government leveraging civilian assets to pursue its national security interests in the South China Sea, a common practice under China's strategy of "military-civil fusion."

The contract for this project was awarded Thursday to Zhejiang Dali Science and Technology Co., Ltd. by Sansha City, which is responsible for administering China’s maritime and territorial claims in the contested South China Sea.

Dali, which appears to also work with the Chinese military, is set to provide a pair of its “DLS-16T Long-Distance Optoelectronic Monitoring Systems” for use on the city’s two main supply ships — the Sansha 1 and Sansha 2 — for 3,830,000 yuan ($547,000).

Multi-function supply ships

The Sansha 1 and Sansha 2 are mainly tasked with supplying Woody Island, which is China’s largest base in the Paracels and serves as the headquarters for Sansha City.

Though the Paracels are claimed by Vietnam, China, and Taiwan, only the PRC occupies any features in the archipelago.

But both vessels have also ventured down further south to the Spratlys, where China is locked in maritime and territorial disputes with Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Taiwan, and Brunei.

Automatic identification system (AIS) data from April 2020 to April 2021 showing the Sansha 1 and Sansha 2 operating in the Paracels and Spratlys. 

Data: MarineTraffic; Analysis: RFA.

The Sansha 1 came into service in January 2015 and the Sansha 2 completed its maiden voyage in August 2019.

This allowed the city’s older Qiongsha 3 supply ship to focus on supplying China’s settlements in the Crescent Group in the Paracels, state-run Hainan Daily reported.

State-owned CSSC Guangzhou Shipyard International, which built the Sansha 2, said that the 128-meter-long vessel would integrate “transportation and supply, administrative jurisdiction, emergency rescue command, emergency medical assistance, and island and reef scientific survey capabilities.”

The company also stated that the Sansha 2 would “play an important role in defending the motherland’s southern gate” — which is how China sometimes refers to its claimed territory in the disputed South China Sea.

Satellite image from December 2020 showing the Sansha 1 and Sansha 2 docked at Woody Island. Image: Planet Labs Inc; Analysis: RFA.

Defending the motherland’s southern gate

Once they are outfitted with their new surveillance equipment, the Sansha 1 and Sansha 2 will be able to play an even greater role in asserting China’s claims.

According to bidding documents reviewed by RFA, the DLS-16T Long-Distance Optoelectronic Monitoring Systems from Dali are intended to allow the supply ships to “carry out omnidirectional search, observation, surveillance, and video evidence collection against maritime and aerial targets” such as ships, overboard people, objects floating in the sea, and aircraft under all weather conditions, 24 hours a day.

Sansha City was seeking a tracking system that would integrate visible light imaging, infrared thermal imaging, automatic target tracking, radar, fog penetration, image enhancement, the U.S.-run satellite navigation system GPS, the Chinese equivalent system BeiDou, and other capabilities, the bidding documents show.

The software system for the tracking equipment is to be used to detect, identify, and track “sensitive ships” from countries like the United States, Japan, the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Taiwan, as well as record and display this information in real-time, the documents say.

Corporate documents from Dali indicate that the company works closely with state-owned Chinese defense contractors and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA).

Dali will be obligated to complete its work on the Sansha 1 and Sansha 2 within three months of signing its contract with Sansha City, the bidding documents say.

Picture of the DLS-16T Long-Distance Optoelectronic Monitoring System from Dali’s website.

Military-civil fusion

China has a long track record of utilizing civilian ships like the Sansha 1 and Sansha 2 to assert control over the South China Sea.

Devin Thorne, a Washington D.C.-based analyst, told RFA that “there are a few ways that China’s civilian fleets contribute to national security as part of military-civil fusion,” referencing China’s strategy of synthesizing resources to simultaneously advance both defense and development goals.

“They help assert China’s maritime rights by simply being active in disputed areas, they facilitate military power projection, and they extend Beijing’s eyes and ears throughout the near seas,” Thorne said.

For example, the Chinese government has installed the BeiDou satellite navigation system — which has built-in texting capabilities — on thousands of fishing boats to enable these vessels to carry out maritime surveillance in the South China Sea, Chinese documents show.

On top of leveraging ordinary fishermen, China also deploys professionalized maritime militia forces to monitor contested areas.

Satellite image from March 25, 2021 showing roughly two hundred Chinese fishing or militia vessels at Whitsun Reef in the Spratly Islands. Image: Planet Labs.

Thorne told RFA that “the fishing vessels of the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia are best suited for carrying out reconnaissance missions given their training in intelligence gathering and ability to covertly linger for long periods in disputed maritime spaces.”
“But since at least 2014, some maritime militias have started enlisting heavy industrial vessels as well. Their role appears to be providing logistics support and conducting reconnaissance missions during military operations,” Thorne explained.
Thorne added that “China’s civilian fleets are also used to apply pressure in territorial disputes and, in some cases, instigate conflict.”

For instance, the presence of over two hundred Chinese fishing or maritime militia vessels at Whitsun Reef in the Spratly Islands sparked a diplomatic showdown between Manila and Beijing in late March, RFA-affiliated news service BenarNews reported.

“Fishing fleets are most frequently at the forefront of this activity.

However, during the 2014 HYSY 981 standoff we also saw China’s state-owned merchant marine chase, ram, and spray Vietnamese ships,” Thorne said.
“I am not aware of another instance in which China has used the merchant marine like this, but the maritime militia and other parts of China’s armed forces have continued to create linkages with industrial fleets. It could happen again,” Thorne warned.

Links :

• CIMSEC : Riding a new wave of professionalization and militarization : Sansha city's maritime militia / China's maritime militia and fishing fleet : a primer for operational staffs and tactical leaders (part 1 / part 2)
• CNN : Beijing has a navy it doesn't even admit exists, experts say. And it's swarming parts of the South China Sea
• Maritime Executive : How Organized is China's Maritime Militia? 
• GeoGarage blog : With swarms of ships, Beijing tightens Its grip on South China Sea

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The rice of the sea: how a tiny grain could change the way humanity eats

Chef Ángel León found eelgrass seeds have 50% more protein than rice – and the plant stores carbon far faster than a rainforest.

Photograph: Álvaro Fernández Prieto/Aponiente

From The Guardian by Ashifa Kassam

Ángel León made his name serving innovative seafood.

But then he discovered something in the seagrass that could transform our understanding of the sea itself – as a vast garden

Growing up in southern Spain, Ángel León paid little attention to the meadows of seagrass that fringed the turquoise waters near his home, their slender blades grazing him as he swam in the Bay of Cádiz.

It was only decades later – as he was fast becoming known as one of the country’s most innovative chefs – that he noticed something he had missed in previous encounters with Zostera marina: a clutch of tiny green grains clinging to the base of the eelgrass.

His culinary instincts, honed over years in the kitchen of his restaurant Aponiente, kicked in.

Could this marine grain be edible?

Lab tests hinted at its tremendous potential: gluten-free, high in omega-6 and -9 fatty acids, and contains 50% more protein than rice per grain, according to Aponiente’s research.

And all of it growing without freshwater or fertiliser.

The find has set the chef, whose restaurant won its third Michelin star in 2017, on a mission to recast the common eelgrass as a potential superfood, albeit one whose singular lifecycle could have far-reaching consequences. 

“In a world that is three-quarters water, it could fundamentally transform how we see oceans,” says León. 

“This could be the beginning of a new concept of understanding the sea as a garden.”

It’s a sweeping statement that would raise eyebrows from anyone else. 

But León, known across Spain as el Chef del Mar (the chef of the sea), has long pushed the boundaries of seafood, fashioning chorizos out of discarded fish parts and serving sea-grown versions of tomatoes and pears at his restaurant near the Bay of Cádiz.

 

The tiny grains within the eelgrass.

The plant is capable of capturing carbon 35 times faster than tropical rainforests.

Photograph: Álvaro Fernández Prieto/Aponiente

“When I started Aponiente 12 years ago, my goal was to open a restaurant that served everything that has no value in the sea,” he says. 

“The first years were awful because nobody understood why I was serving customers produce that nobody wanted.”

Still, he pushed forward with his “cuisine of the unknown seas”.

His efforts to bring little-known marine species to the fore were recognised in 2010 with his first Michelin star.

By the time the restaurant earned its third star, León had become a fixture on Spain’s gastronomy scene: a trailblazing chef determined to redefine how we treat the sea.

What León and his team refer to as “marine grain” expands on this, in one of his most ambitious projects to date.

After stumbling across the grain in 2017, León began looking for any mention of Zostera marina being used as food.

He finally found an article from 1973 in the journal Science on how it was an important part of the diet of the Seri, an Indigenous people living on the Gulf of California in Sonora, Mexico, and the only known case of a grain from the sea being used as a human food source.

Next came the question of whether the perennial plant could be cultivated.

In the Bay of Cádiz, the once-abundant plant had been reduced to an area of just four sq metres, echoing a decline seen around the world as seagrass meadows reel from increased human activity along coastlines and steadily rising water temperatures.

Working with a team at the University of Cádiz and researchers from the regional government, a pilot project was launched to adapt three small areas across a third of a hectare (0.75 acres) of salt marshes into what León calls a “marine garden”.

It was not until 18 months later – after the plants had produced grains – that León steeled himself for the ultimate test, said Juan Martín, Aponiente’s environmental manager.

Salt marshes near Cádiz were used to create a ‘marine garden’ where the eelgrass seeds could be sown. Photograph: Álvaro Fernández Prieto/Aponiente

“Ángel came to me, his tone very serious, and said: ‘Juan, I would like to have some grains because I have no idea how it tastes. Imagine if it doesn’t taste good,’” says Martín. 

“It’s incredible. He threw himself into it blindly, invested his own money, and he had never even tried this marine grain.”

León put the grain through a battery of recipes, grinding it to make flour for bread and pasta and steeping it in flavours to mimic Spain’s classic rice dishes.
“It’s interesting. When you eat it with the husk, similar to brown rice, it has a hint of the sea at the end,” says León. 

“But without the husk, you don’t taste the sea.”

He found that the grain absorbed flavour well, taking two minutes longer to cook than rice and softening if overcooked.

In the marine garden, León and his team were watching as the plant lived up to its reputation as an architect of ecosystems: transforming the abandoned salt marsh into a flourishing habitat teeming with life, from seahorses to scallops.

The plant’s impact could stretch much further.

Capable of capturing carbon 35 times faster than tropical rainforests and described by the WWF as an “incredible tool” in fighting the climate crisis, seagrass absorbs 10% of the ocean’s carbon annually despite covering just 0.2% of the seabed.

News of what León and his team were up to soon began making waves around the world. 

“When I first heard of it, I was going ‘Wow, this is very interesting,’” says Robert Orth, a professor at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, who has spent more than six decades studying seagrass. 

“I don’t know of anyone that has attempted to do what this chef has done.”

We’ve opened a window. 

It's a new way to feed ourselves

According to Orth, seagrass has been used as insulation for houses, roofing material and even for packing seafood, but never cultivated as food. 

It is an initiative riddled with challenges. 

Wild seagrass meadows have been dying off at an alarming rate in recent decades, while few researchers have managed to successfully transplant and grow seagrass, he says.

In southern Spain, however, the team’s first marine garden suggests potential average harvests could be about 3.5 tonnes a hectare. 

While the yield is about a third of what one could achieve with rice, León points to the potential for low-cost and environmentally friendly cultivation. 

“If nature gifts you with 3,500kg without doing anything – no antibiotics, no fertiliser, just seawater and movement – then we have a project that suggests one can cultivate marine grain.”

 

A pilot project was successful in cultivating seagrass and obtaining grains that Ángel León then tried in different recipes. 

Photograph: www.mapdigital.es

The push is now on to scale up the project, adapting as much as five hectares of salt marshes into areas for cultivating eelgrass.

Every success is carefully tracked, in hopes of better understanding the conditions – from water temperature to salinity – that the plant needs to thrive.

While it is likely to be years before the grain becomes a staple at Aponiente, León’s voice rises with excitement as he considers the transformative possibility of Zostera marina’s minuscule, long-overlooked grain – and its reliance on only seawater for irrigation. 

“In the end, it’s like everything,” he says.

“If you respect the areas in the sea where this grain is being grown, it would ensure humans take care of it. It means humans would defend it.”

He and his team envision a global reach for their project, paving the way for people to harness the plant’s potential to boost aquatic ecosystems, feed populations and fight the climate crisis. 

“We’ve opened a window,” says León. 

“I believe it’s a new way to feed ourselves.”

Links :

• The Guardian : Meet the 'star ingredient' changing fortunes in Alaska's waters: seaweed
• GeoGarage blog : The Seas will save us: How an army of ocean farmers are starting an economic revolution