Tiempo Climate Newswatch

The food security of millions of people is threatened by damage to the world ocean caused by over-fishing, climate change and pollution, warned marine scientists at the Fourth Global Conference on Oceans, Coasts and Islands, held in Hanoi, Vietnam, April 2008. "People think the ocean is a place apart," observed Peter Neill of the World Ocean Observatory. "In fact it's the thing that connects us - through trade, transportation, natural systems." It is estimated that 75 per cent of fish stocks are now fully exploited or depleted. "Increasingly, we are starting to see long term [climate] change affect the productivity, the distributions, the migrations," reported Steven Murawski, fisheries chief science advisor at the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The Hanoi conference heard reports on the state of the local seas. On the South China Sea, Vo Si Tuan, who represented Vietnam on the South China Sea Project, said that "the key issues... are habitat degradation and loss, overfishing and land-based pollution." "The international trends are more pronounced in the South China Sea," according to Keith Symington of the World Wide Fund for Nature. "Boats have to go further and fish longer to catch the same amount of fish and they are catching smaller fish," he said. The conference heard that Halong Bay, a world heritage-listed site, is facing extensive reef destruction because of heavy sedimentation as erosion caused by deforestation increases the silt load. On the coast, shrimp farming and land reclamation have resulted in the loss of mangrove forests. Shipping, coal mining and tourism are increasing pollution.

Political leaders from Japan and the European Union (EU) have called for a "highly ambitious and binding international approach... to deal with the scale and urgency of the climate change challenge." They have advanced a plan for an International Partnership for Cooperation on Energy Efficiency, which will be put before the Group of Eight later this year.

Japan's proposal for sectoral targets, broken down by industrial sector, was on the agenda of the annual meeting between the two parties. "I believe there was an understanding shown from the EU towards our approach, which will be effective in ensuring fairness in setting national targets," Yasuo Fukuda, Japanese prime minister, said. The proposal has been greeted with suspicion by developing nations, who fear it may force them to purchase climate-friendly technology.

The Maldives is calling for deep cuts in global greenhouse gas emissions. President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom is unhappy "because what the international community has agreed so far is not enough to save our country and other low-lying area countries." Gayoom was speaking on the publication of a collection of his speeches on the climate crisis, entitled Paradise Drowning.

Despite concerns about emissions from international flights, Gayoom is not prepared to cut tourism. "I don't think it's a viable option for us to cut down on tourism because it's the mainstay of our economy," he said. "It's up to the business community, the corporate community, to look at alternatives to air travel as it is now - to have more efficient fuel, alternative methods of fuel consumption, safer methods, greener methods - we are the victims," he continued.