New whale watching regulations suggested for Pacific Island countries
Updated
An international animal welfare group has released a set of guidelines to assist Pacific Island nations to create legislation to manage the growing whale watching industry. This week in Hawaii the International Fund for Animal Welfare used the International Conference for Marine Mammal Protection to launch its "Pacific Islands Regional Guidelines for Whale and Dolphin Watching". The guidelines were written with input from countries with regulations already in place, and IFAW says it has support from the government of most countries in the region.
Presenter Campbell Cooney
Speaker: Pacific Officer with the International Fund for Animal Welfare Olive Andrews
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COONEY: For Pacific Island nations whale watching is either already, or has the potential, to be a lucrative business, and the chance to get close to the giants of the ocean attracts people from around the world. A Pacific Officer with the International Fund for Animal Welfare, Olive Andrews says the number of them goes up each year.
ANDREWS: It is growing at a staggering 45 per cent a year and this far higher than average tourism growth in the region, and indeed far higher than whale watching growth in places like Australia and New Zealand.
COONEY: But while many island nations want the tourists, a lot of them don't have any control over those offering a whale watching experience in their country. The IFAW's figures show just four Pacific Islands Countries have any legislation or guidelines on whale watching.
ANDREWS: We really have a cumulative, I guess, problem happening where boats are watching whales and interacting with whales in various different countries along their migration. And as a group of countries that I guess in the migratory part of these animals, we have a collective responsibility to manage them.
COONEY: Now, the Fund has released a set of rules which it says will provide an experience which will keep visitors happy, but ensure the safety of whales within the region. Olive Andrews says it has the support of most island nations in the region.
ANDREWS: They target things like licensing for whale watching operators, as a management measure. They look at options for government to do, to protect the whales more from the industry and that might mean things like seasonal closures or putting areas aside for whales to rest, where they are not being watched by boats. There are set of best practice guidelines, which are the operational aspects of whale watching, so the best ways in which to manoeuvre the boats, to reduce the potential impacts of whale watching on the whales, and also to maximise the educational benefits of the activity to the tourists involved.
COONEY: One of the big attractions in Vava'u and Tonga is you get to actually swim with the whales. Is this something that is included in these guidelines?
ANDREWS: It is indeed. Elsewhere in the world, swimmers I guess can be quite controversial and people have opinions about the potential impact of the activity both on the people and on the whales. We are committed to working with the Governments and industry in the Pacific where whale swimming occurs, to make sure that this industry develops sustainably and responsibly.
COONEY: But tourism is a competitive business. And if word gets out you can get closer to the whales in one country, than its neighbour, that's likely to be the place they will go to. As well many island nations, reliant on aid and remittances for their economic survival do not have the resources needed to police legislation like that laid out in the IFAW statement. While it accepts those limitations, Ms Andrews says it is confident the rules, as laid out will be followed, with operators expected to police their own and others whale watching activities.
ANDREWS: Essentially this has buy in or it has sign off at the highest governmental level. There is a very varying scale on the kind of responsibility that whale watching operators take. So we rely on the operators in those areas to do the right thing and in fact they become the example to the private boaters of which there are thousands.
