(from "Report of the Scientific Committee", the version distributed at 2000 meeting)

The Committee agreed that it would not discuss legal, political or economic issues regarding the Sanctuary. These included questions of interpretation of the Convention, the level of support for the proposal amongst nations of the South Pacific forum and the relative merits and compatibility of whalewatching versus direct exploitation. Such matters were raised in several working papers submitted to the Committee but are not discussed here.

Several papers were presented that summarised information on whales in the South Pacific region (SC/52/IA6, 8, 16, 20 and SC/52/O9, 12, 17, 28, 29, 33 and 34; and Reeves et al., 1999). Many of these papers were discussed in detail by the relevant sub-committees. Eleven species are known to occur within the proposed sanctuary area: (1) blue whale; (2) humpback whale; (3) sperm whale; (4) southern right whale; (5) fin whale; (6) sei whale; (7) Antarctic minke whale; (8) dwarf minke whale; (9) Bryde's whale; (10) pygmy Bryde's whale; and (11) pygmy right whale. Fin, sei and pygmy right whales are rarely seen within the area. Almost all of these have been at some stage commercially harvested. The blue, fin, right and humpback whales are probably the most severely depleted but there is little firm evidence on the status of most of species relative to their initial abundance. It is ten years since the status of any of these species was considered (minke whales in 1990; IWC, 1991b). SC/52/O34 illustrates the limited data available for even the better known species. Information on the breeding grounds and migration routes of the whales in the region is poor, apart from for the humpback whale. SC/52/IA6 and 20 examined what is known on stock identity and movements for humpback whales in the South Pacific. The results indicate that the proposed sanctuary would include the wintering grounds of all Group V and most, if not all, of Group VI humpback whales. Information on the breeding grounds and migration routes of the whales in the region is poor, apart from for the humpback whale. SC/52/IA6 and 20 examined what is known on stock identity and movements for humpback whales in the South Pacific. The results indicate that the proposed sanctuary would include the wintering grounds of one or more populations of humpback whales.

SC/52/O28 summarises recent great whale research in the region, complementing the review of Reeves et al. (1999). Humpback whales and right whales are probably the best studied species compared to the others in the South Pacific. Generally, more is known of the mysticete species in their feeding grounds in the Antarctic than in the South Pacific.

There is no commercial or aboriginal/subsistence whaling in the area at the present time. Only the minke whale has been considered in the context of the RMP. There have been catches of Antarctic minke whales and dwarf minke whales in the same longitudinal band as the proposed sanctuary but south of its southern boundary.

There is little information on whether bycatches of large whales occur in fishing nets within the area (bycatches of large whales are known to occur in other areas when they come into contact with set or driftnets). Some entanglement of humpback and southern right whales has been documented off southeastern Australia.

Over the last 20 years, the Committee has had several major discussions of Sanctuaries, both in general terms and related to specific proposals for the Indian Ocean Sanctuary and the Southern Ocean Sanctuary. These discussions have been extensive in some cases (IWC, 1980; 1993a) but have never resulted in a consensus view by the Committee.

The Committee reviewed these discussions and agreed that the major points made in the past related to the desirability or otherwise of a sanctuary also applied to the South Pacific proposal. It was unable to reach a consensus view and the major arguments from this and previous meetings are summarised below.

General arguments in favour of Sanctuary proposals
Sanctuaries:

(1)

Provide a focus for regional co-operation at the government, inter-government and non-government level.

(2)

Provide a focus for the development of national, international non-lethal research programmes.

(3)

Provide a non-lethal research framework that will enable the Commission to make appropriate decisions to ensure the effective conservation of whale stocks in the region.

(4)

Provide an area to study whales undisturbed by any whaling activities.

(5)

Provide an 'insurance' against unforeseen problems with the RMP.

(6)

Protect all whales within a large habitat - an IWC sanctuary protects whales from commercial whaling and this is seen as a necessary first step in a more comprehensive management regime.

General arguments not in favour of Sanctuary proposals

(1)

Sanctuary proposals only address direct catches. Current (Schedule) and likely future (RMP) management strategies of the IWC would only allow exploitation of abundant whale stocks and then at conservative and sustainable levels.

(2)

Sanctuaries provide no extra protection for the most vulnerable depleted stocks from actual threats that they face such as habitat destruction, pollution, shipping, fisheries interactions, etc. and do not distinguish between areas of critical habitat and those of little importance. Such stocks are already protected under existing IWC management measures.

(3)

Sanctuary provisions may prevent utilisation of stocks for which a sustainable catch would be allowed under the RMP/RMS.

(4)

Whether or not an area is designated as a Sanctuary is irrelevant to whether or not research is carried out in the area.

(5)

The need to provide information relevant for management and utilisation of one species may stimulate research that is also of value in monitoring depleted species.

In the context of these arguments, a number of points particular to the South Pacific Sanctuary were raised in discussion.

Childerhouse referred to Richards' (2000) review of historical sail whaling records from the Exclusive Economic Zones of Pacific Forum nations in the South Pacific, in which the number of whales killed was estimated (for EEZ waters alone). This was estimated at approximately 32,200 sperm whales (1804-1876), over 30,000 right whales (1827-1930) and over 3,100 humpback whales (1805-1909). If whales killed outside this area, but within the South Pacific region are included, this figure would be significantly higher. 'Best guess' estimates of the present abundance in this same region are 13,200 sperm whales, 200 right whales and 4,100 humpback whales. A comparison of the magnitude of kills against present abundance estimates gives values of 41% for sperm whales and less than 1% for right whales. The present number of humpback whales is higher than the estimated number killed, which reflects the fact that humpbacks were not taken often by sail whalers, on whom much of this study is based. Childerhouse believed that these values supports the conclusion that the present number of sperm and southern right whales in this region is significantly less than pre-exploitation numbers.

Morishita disputed the conclusion with respect to sperm whales. The annual average catch over the period was around 440 or 3.3% of the estimated current abundance. For humpback whales the value is 0.7%. He found it difficult to believe that such levels of removals would lead to severe depletion. He also noted that he did not believe that there were scientific or logical reasons to protect all species when not all are depleted.

Palazzo made the general comment that the National Aquatic Mammals Research, Management and Conservation Centre (the leading scientific and management authority in Brazil) had endorsed the sanctuary proposal.

There was also some general discussion over the extent to which sanctuary declarations resulted in increased research. Schweder noted the extensive research in the Southern Ocean Sanctuary carried out by Japan, and queried whether there was increased research effort in 'non-use' countries. In response, attention was drawn to the Antarctic research programmes of Australia, Brazil, Chile, New Zealand, the UK and the work of the SOWER 2000 programme, details of which continue to be reported to the Committee. Attention was also drawn to the non-lethal research already occurring in the proposed area of the sanctuary which is providing information of benefit to management. For example information on stock structure and trends in abundance of humpback whales in the region has proved valuable to the in-depth assessment of this species currently being undertaken by the Committee. This also illustrates the value of collaborative research in the region.

Attention was drawn to Butterworth and Punt (1994) and Butterworth and Punt (1994) which used simulation studies to investigate whether parameters such as MSYR and issues such as the effect of habitat deterioration could be better estimated for the Southern Ocean, with or without a 50-year Sanctuary provision. The authors concluded that the presence of an Antarctic-wide sanctuary did not aid in addressing these questions, whilst unnecessarily preventing 50 years of catch.

Cooke and Childerhouse noted that estimates of some other parameters of whale populations in the proposed Sanctuary have been obtained using non-lethal methods. These estimates already have a higher level of precision than that which, according to the simulations in the above studies would be possible after 100 years of catches. They concluded that the results of those simulations had little bearing on the actual potential for monitoring whale populations in the proposed Sanctuary. Butterworth responded that if the view of Cooke and Childerhouse was correct this would have been revealed in the results of the papers whereas they had in fact shown the contrary.

Best observed that neither the Action Plan for Australian Cetaceans (Bannister et al., 1996) nor the South Pacific Regional Environment Programme (Reeves et al., 1999) commented on the need for a sanctuary in the region. It was also not the result of a recommendation by the Scientific Committee. He believed that this revealed little scientific or urgent conservation need for the Sanctuary as proposed.

In conclusion, the Committee noted that whilst it has received guidance from the Commission on factors of interest to the Commission in reviews of scientific permits, this is not the case for sanctuary proposals. A Technical Committee working group met in 1982 to consider requirements for the listing of sanctuaries but its report (IWC/34/14) was not adopted by the Commission. The Committee agreed that advice from the Commission with respect to reviews of sanctuary proposals would be useful in the future.

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