WELLINGTON (THE POST) — A Greenpeace expedition has set off from New Zealand to survey seamounts and other deep sea habitats in the region’s oceans.
With two specialist marine scientists on board the specialist ship, Greenpeace said it would use remotely operated deep-sea cameras to survey seamounts and other features in both New Zealand waters and the high seas of the South Pacific.
Speaking from on board the ship, expedition leader Ellie Hooper said many of the deep-sea areas had not been studied before.
“We know that seamounts and other underwater hills, knolls and ridges are critical habitats for coral and sponges, as well as feeding and spawning grounds for other creatures further up the food chain, but we have big gaps in our knowledge,” she said.
“We’re heading out to the deep ocean to try and survey these vital habitats, some of which are threatened by bottom trawl fishing.”
One of the sites the team planned to visit was where a New Zealand bottom trawler, the Nelson-based Tasman Viking, pulled up 37kg of deep-sea coral in the Lord Howe Rise area, which was renowned for diverse marine life. The aim was to record the species at the site and document any damage.
Greenpeace said requests for the co-ordinates of the coral encounter area were declined by the New Zealand Government because of “commercial sensitivity”, with the location eventually released to the expedition’s lead researcher by Australian officials.
Hooper called the refusal to share the co-ordinates “ludicrous” and “a blatant example of the Luxon-led Government running interference for the fishing industry”.
“We need more ocean research, not less,” she said.
“So often we have to rely on the bycatch that comes up in trawl nets to understand what lives in the deep sea. That’s why we’ve decided to conduct this work so we can better understand what’s out there.
“We want to add to our collective understanding of these deep sea ecosystems, about which so little is known, and to shine a light in the dark.”
Hooper said the seamount expedition was a “challenging mission”.
“Like all deep-sea work, we’re at the mercy of the weather and the waves,” she said.
“But we’re committed to giving it a shot as part of our mission to protect the oceans better for the future.”
Seafood New Zealand chief executive Lisa Futschek said the industry body was “very interested” to hear about Greenpeace’s expedition and she would have “loved the opportunity” to send one of their own “science people” along.
“We are always keen to collaborate,” she said. “We welcome an open and constructive dialogue with all parties who share these objectives.”
Futschek said Seafood NZ was doing “a lot of fantastic work” to minimise the impact of fishing on seabirds and marine mammals as well as being a keen innovator, often trying out new gear that could lighten the impact on the environment.
“It sounds like the Greenpeace boat will be going into one of the very few areas where fishing is allowed on the high seas,” she said.
“The vast majority of seamounts in these deepwater areas are closed to fishing [and only] a very small number can be accessed for food production purposes.
“So naturally, they should see some evidence of that on the ocean floor.”
Futschek said 99.9 percent of the high seas were closed to bottom fishing methods “in this part of the globe”.
“Alongside whatever images Greenpeace can get from the fishing areas, it would be great to see a proportionate amount of footage from the many millions of kilometres where fishing doesn’t happen, so people can understand how incredibly tiny the impact of food production is at sea,” she said…. PACNEWS