WORLD WETLANDS DAY 2007

Each year World Wetlands Day is celebrated with a host of events throughout the country when Fish & Game NZ leads a range of organizations in creating varied wetland experiences around that year’s WWD theme, chosen to highlight an issue facing wetlands internationally.

This year’s theme is ‘Fish for Tomorrow?’ - focusing on over-fishing of the world’s marine and inland fisheries, all of which depend on healthy functional wetlands as the nursery grounds for freshwater and marine fish species.

This touches almost everyone, wherever you live and whatever you do, as most of us eat fish or shellfish, and indeed 1 billion people rely on them as their main source, or sole, source of protein. Yet the current state of the world’s fisheries is a matter of great concern.

While 75% of our commercially important marine fisheries and many of our inland stocks are currently being over-fished or are being fished at their biological limits, the demand for fish continues to grow - indeed it has doubled over the last 40 years and is likely to continue to grow as global population increases.

In addition, of the 35 million people currently involved in the industry, 95% live in developing countries and the majority are small-scale fishers: their livelihoods dependent on making sure there will be fish for tomorrow.

This is a central issue for Ramsar (the international body that governs the wise use and management of wetlands) as inland and marine fisheries depend on healthy, functioning wetlands. Near-shore coastal wetlands are the nursery grounds of deeper ocean species and most of the coastal species that make up fish catches, and mangroves and temperate coastal wetlands support marine aquaculture. Inland fisheries, both capture and aquaculture, are of course equally dependent on healthy lakes, ponds and rivers.

Ramsar briefly summarises the following as important in the solution to our endangered fisheries:

• Better management of capture fisheries at international, national, and local levels, including the implementation of Ramsar’s guidelines on fisheries and FAO’s Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries amongst many other management approaches;
  
  
• Improved marine and inland aquaculture practices, since this now supplies around 40% of the fish (including prawns, lobster, oysters, etc) that we eat;
  
  
• A conscientious approach to buying and consuming fish wherever possible;
  
  
• A sustainable approach to recreational fishing, which can have significant effects on inland and marine fisheries in some cases.

Wetlands are disappearing worldwide, despite the fact that they are amongst the most important ecosystems on the planet. They store and purify water, replenish groundwater, store carbon and support biological diversity.

According to the United Nations, last century 50% of the world’s remaining wetlands were destroyed, while other wetlands have been significantly modified to fragment and alter water flow in 60% of the world’s largest rivers, compromising many valuable ecosystem functions.

Fish and Game New Zealand is the lead agency for World Wetlands Day, each year coordinating a large number of agencies to hold events that mark the day. Agencies participating this year include: The Department of Conservation, Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society, Mighty River Power, Iwi, Regional and District Councils, and the National Wetlands Trust.