Bid to give more protection to cetaceans
Maritime traffic presents a danger to migrating whales
REDUCING the speed of maritime traffic will help prevent deaths of whales through ship strikes and improve their ability to communicate.
Regional councillor for the ecological transition, Mireia Mollà will ask the national government to introduce the measure in the ‘whale corridor’ off the coast. This area stretches from the shores of Alicante, Valencia and Castellón provinces as far as the French border – and across to the Balearic Islands.
Sra Mollà said lowering speed by 10% cuts the risk of collisions with dolphins and whales by up to 50%. It will also reduce noise levels below the surface which are interfering with the communication and reproduction of cetaceans.
She reminded that animals such as the fin whale migrate along the ‘corridor’ to reach areas in the north of the Mediterranean – principally the Ligurian Sea off France and Italy. The councillor spoke about initiatives discussed at a Mediterranean climate conference in Barcelona last week, which have been raised in conjunction with colleagues from Cataluña and the Balearics.
The speed reduction campaign has been led by the international organisation, Ocean Care, she added.
Campaign success
Ocean Care have scored a recent success in their Mediterranean protection campaigns.
At the end of January, they noted that leading shipping and logistics conglomerate, MSC Group, had agreed to re-route their ships on the west coast of Greece to reduce the risk of collision with endangered sperm whales.
The decision was made after a coalition of environmental NGOs approached MSC Group to move their ships away from a critical habitat for this subpopulation of whales, of which only 200 to 300 individuals remain.
Their studies have identified the Hellenic Trench, to the west and south of the Peloponnese region and southwest of Crete, as critical habitat for these whales.
An Ocean Care spokesperson noted that these deep diving whales are ‘found here year-round – the only area where family groups have been observed in the eastern Mediterranean, and they concentrate around the 1000m depth contour – directly in the path of busy shipping routes’.
“The whales found dead on the shore with propeller marks and cuts are just the tip of the iceberg,” said Dr Alexandros Frantzis, scientific director of Pelagos Cetacean Research Institute. “Up to 20 times more die offshore and are never recorded.”
He noted that urgent action was needed before ‘deaths through ship strikes cause this already small population to go extinct’.
Western Med
In a joint declaration from the regions of Valencia,
Cataluña and the Balearics, they called on the Spanish government and the EU to give more weight to policies to mitigate climate change in the Mediterranean area.
Sra Mollà added: “We have asked the government to attend to the singularity of the Mediterranean ecosystem and to reserve funding for it.”
The cash would help them to ‘reverse the loss of biodiversity and minimise the pressure on the marine environment and its resources’.
This includes preventing 200,000 tonnes of plastic from ending up in the sea each year, noted the councillor.
Secretary for the ecological transition, Paula Tuzón explained that they are currently mapping out the estimated 30,000 hectares of sea prairies which lie off the shores of the Valencia region.
This will help them to better protect these vital areas for marine fauna.