WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama will create the largest protected area on the planet Friday, by expanding a national marine monument off the coast of his native Hawaii to encompass 582,578 square miles of land and sea.
The move, which more than quadruples the size of the Papahanaumokuakea (pronounced “Papa-ha-now-moh-koo-ah-kay-ah”) Marine National Monument that President George W. Bush established a decade ago, underscores the extent to which Obama has elevated the issues of conservation and climate change in his second term. Obama has now used his executive authority under the 1906 Antiquities Act to protect more than 548 million acres of federal land and water, more than double what any of his predecessors have done.
Many scientists, environmentalists and native Hawaiians have argued that recent scientific deepwater discoveries and threats of climate change and seabed mining warrant more stringent protection of the remote and biologically rich region. The roughly 1,200-mile-long archipelago, which is known as the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands and lies about 270 miles northwest of Oahu, is protected by a buffer of 50 nautical miles from shore in all directions.
“The oceans are the untold story when it comes to climate change, and we have to feel a sense of urgency when it comes to protecting the ocean that sustains us,” said Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, who helped broker a compromise proposal with groups including native Hawaiians and day-boat fishermen.
All commercial extraction activities, including commercial fishing and any future deep-sea mining, will be prohibited in the expanded monument. However, recreational fishing, removal of resources for traditional Hawaiian cultural purposes and scientific research will be allowed with a federal permit.
Obama will highlight his announcement Wednesday in an address before the Pacific Islands Conference of Leaders and the IUCN World Conservation Congress in Honolulu, and will travel the following day to Midway Atoll, which is located within the current monument.
Longline fishermen lobbied against any new protections, arguing that their operations eschew damaging practices such as trawling and need flexibility to sustain an annual catch valued at more than $100 million.
“We move all over the ocean, in the way the fish move,” said Jim Cook, co-owner of POP Fishing and Marine, adding that the new restrictions mean that 60 percent of federal waters off Hawaii are now closed to fishing.
With Friday’s action, a total of seven presidents – starting with Theodore Roosevelt in 1909 – have taken steps to safeguard part of the archipelago, which is one of the most biologically diverse areas of the world. It features the largest seabird gathering site in the world, with more than 14 million birds from 22 species, nearly all of the remaining endangered Hawaiian monk seals, Hawaiian green sea turtles and Laysan albatrosses.
Recent research expeditions have unearthed extraordinary features beyond the existing monument boundaries such as the world’s oldest living animal – a black coral estimated to be 4,500 years old – and six massive seamounts, one of which is nearly 14,000 feet high and teeming with life. This area also includes the USS Yorktown, which sank during the Battle of Midway in 1942 and has not been visited since it was discovered there in 1998.
Picture: AP
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(c) 2016, The Washington Post ยท Juliet Eilperin
