Posted on 18 March 2010
Doha, Qatar – Discussion of a long-awaited
proposal to ban international commercial
trade in Atlantic bluefin tuna was cut short
today at the largest
wildlife trade convention when an immediate
vote was pushed through.
Member governments of
the Convention on International Trade in
Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora
(CITES) chose to vote today on the proposal.
72 out of 129 CITES members voted against
the trade ban, 43 voted in favour, with
14 abstentions.
“After overwhelming
scientific justification and growing political
support in past months – with backing from
the majority of catch quota holders on both
sides of the Atlantic – it is scandalous
that governments did not even get the chance
to engage in meaningful debate about the
international trade ban proposal for Atlantic
bluefin tuna,” said Dr Sergi Tudela, Head
of Fisheries at WWF Mediterranean and observer
at the CITES Conference of the Parties in
Doha.
Once the Principality
of Monaco had tabled the proposal this afternoon
and a number of countries had given brief
interventions, Libya called for an immediate
vote on the proposal.
“The regional fisheries
management organization in charge of this
fishery – the International Commission for
the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas, ICCAT
– has repeatedly failed to sustainably manage
this fishery,” said Dr Tudela. “ICCAT has
so far failed miserably in this duty so
every pressure at the highest level must
come to bear to ensure it does what it should.”
WWF will proactively
call on restaurants, retailers, chefs and
consumers around the world to stop selling,
serving, buying and eating this endangered
species. Already a growing body of the global
seafood market sector is choosing to avoid
Atlantic bluefin tuna to give the exhausted
fish stocks a chance of recovery – including
such groups as Carrefour Europe.
“It is now more important
than ever for people to do what the politicians
failed to do – stop consuming bluefin tuna,”
Dr Tudela said.
The Principality of
Monaco – the CITES member country that submitted
the proposal for a CITES Appendix I listing
of the species – became last year the first
country in the world to be entirely bluefin
tuna free. WWF is urging other countries
to follow suit.
+ More
Human health linked
directly to forest health
Posted on 19 March 2010
Gland, Switzerland – Environmental degradation
is causing serious detrimental health impacts
for humans, but protecting natural habitats
can reverse this and supply positive health
benefits, according to a new WWF report.
“Our research confirms
what we know instinctively: Human health
is inextricably linked to the health of
the planet,” says Chris Elliot, WWF’s Executive
Director of Conservation.
Vital Sites: The Contribution
of Protected Areas to Human Health notes
that the World Health Organization (WHO)
estimates between 23 and 25 per cent of
the global disease burden could be avoided
by improved management of environmental
conditions.
The report, released
in advance of World Forestry Day on March
21, singles out deforestation for its key
impacts on human health.
“Deforestation is a
double blow to human health,” says Elliot.
“It increases the spread of certain diseases
while destroying plants and animals that
may hold the key to treating illnesses that
plague millions of people.”
Protecting natural landscapes
can contribute positively to human health
through protecting future medicinal resources,
reducing the impacts of pollution, toxins
and weather extremes and providing recreational
places that support physical and mental
well-being.
World Forestry Day takes
on special significance this year, as 2010
is the International Year of Biodiversity.
“Vital Sites” makes a strong case for protecting
biodiversity.
In the forests of Borneo
alone in the past decade WWF reports discoveries
of trees and shrubs that may be used to
treat cancer, HIV and malaria. In all, 422
new plant species have been discovered in
Borneo in the last 25 years, but deforestation
puts them and others waiting to be discovered
at risk.
“When WWF stresses the
importance of biodiversity, it’s not just
because we enjoy a variety of trees or frogs
in a forest. It’s because the science tells
us that those trees and frogs are vital
to the forest’s health, and the forest’s
health is vital to our health,” says Elliot.
The report stresses
that while people are good at cultivating
plants whose value is known, we have a poor
track record at conserving those seen as
having little use for humans. The problem
is, habitat destruction is eliminating potentially
valuable species before they can even be
discovered, let alone tested.
This short-sighted use
of forest resources has major economic implications
as well; by the year 2000, plant-based pharmaceuticals
were estimated to earn more than $30 billion
per year.
“Vital Sites” should
be a wake-up call, not just for people concerned
with protecting natural resources and biodiversity,
but for anyone interested in protecting
and promoting human health.
“Most people think of
protected areas like national parks and
nature reserves as tools for wildlife conservation,
but by protecting whole habitats and ecosystems
the world’s protected areas offer us some
very practical social benefits as well,”
writes Dr. Kathy MacKinnon, lead biodiversity
specialist for the World Bank, in the report’s
foreword.
