Source: Duke University
Contact: Tim Lucas (919) 613-8084 tdlucas@duke.edu
DURHAM, N.C. – An international team of researchers has developed a comprehensive set of criteria to help the International Seabed Authority (ISA) protect local biodiversity from deep-sea mining activities. These guidelines should help identify areas of particular environmental importance where no mining should occur.
Continue reading A Strategy for making ‘No-Mining Zones’- in the Deep Sea
Source: BBC
Author: Adrienne Bernhard
Geologists have charted mountain ranges and forests and desert tundras, astronomers the heavens above, yet our planet’s oceans remain largely unexplored; it’s often said that we have a more complete understanding of the Moon or Mars than we do of our own seabed.
Continue reading The quest to map the mysteries of the ocean floor
Source: Oceans Deeply
Author: Todd Woody
Those were the words of Olav Myklebust, president of the council of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) on March 5 as he opened the semi-annual meeting of the United Nations-chartered organization charged with protecting the fragile and unique ecosystems of the deep ocean while opening them up to industrial mining.
Continue reading Nations Put New Focus on Environmental Impacts of Deep-Sea Mining
Source: Smithsonian.com
Author: Kyle Frischkorn
Charting these watery depths could transform oceanography. It could also aid deep sea miners looking for profit.
Continue reading Why The First Complete Map of the Ocean Floor Is Stirring Controversial Waters
Source: The Tyee
Author: Harrison Tasoff
In the coming years, a new gold rush will begin. Deep beneath the ocean’s waves, from scalding hydrothermal vents to the frigid stretches of the abyssal plain, ocean processes have deposited vast quantities of valuable minerals on the seafloor. Now, the convergence of technological development and political will has placed this ore within reach. But like the gold rushes of old, the deep-sea-mining industry is emerging on the frontiers of society, far from legislatures and law enforcement.
Continue reading Deep Sea Mining Industry Is Totally Wild West
From 1-3 December 2011, the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN) and the IUCN Environmental Law Centre (ELC) jointly organized an international seminar on the “Conservation and Sustainable Use of Marine Biodiversity beyond National Jurisdiction”.
Continue reading Summary Report on BfN-IUCN Seminar on Areas beyond National Jurisdiction
DSCC Intervention
Preparatory Session:
Review Conference on the Agreement for the Implementation of the Provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December 1982 relating to the Conservation and Management of Straddling Fish Stocks and Highly Migratory Fish Stocks New York, 24-28 May 2010
NRDC/DSCC Intervention
Continue reading DSCC Statement Made to UN Fish Stocks Review Conference Preparatory Meeting
The second meeting of the Ad Hoc Open-ended Informal Working Group of the United Nations General Assembly to study issues relating to the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity beyond areas of national jurisdiction (the Working Group) concluded today (2nd May) at the United Nations (UN) headquarters in New York.
Continue reading STATES ACKNOWLEDGE DESTRUCTIVE IMPACT OF DEEP-SEA FISHING
This year’s UN Open-ended Informal Consultative Process on Oceans and the Law of the Sea (UNICP) examined the issue of Marine Genetic Resources, with members of the DSCC in attendance. During the meeting, the DSCC made the following statement: “For the past several years, the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition has highlighted the threats to deep-sea marine biodiversity from human activities, in particular high seas bottom trawling. As noted by Iceland, the language in UNGA 61/105 addresses some of those threats and we look forward to states and regional organisations acting to implement the elements contained in that resolution to protect and conserve deep-sea biodiversity from destructive fishing practices, actions which will also be reviewed, as per the resolution, by the UNGA in 2009.
The 7th UN Informal Consultative Process on Oceans and Law of the Sea met in New York from 12-16 June to discuss the ecosystem approach to managing human activities in the oceans.
Continue reading Time to deal definitively with the problem of high seas bottom trawling
