Introduction
The Southern Ocean is an area of marine wilderness containing some of the Earth’s most remote and intact marine ecosystems. Southern Ocean ecosystems support biodiversity, provide resources for commercial fisheries, and drive global climate patterns essential for human existence. However, these ecosystems are increasingly threatened by expanding resource exploitation and intensifying climate change impacts.
The Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR) are responsible for the conservation of Antarctic biodiversity and marine living resources and have committed to establish a system of Southern Ocean Marine Protected Areas (MPAs).
Currently only 12 percent of the Southern Ocean is protected through MPAs, and many ecosystems and important features in the Southern Ocean are not currently included in existing protected areas. Many of these ecosystems and features exist within the Domain 9 planning region. A MPA in Domain 9 is thus a critical component of agreed strategies to ensure resilience of this vulnerable and rapidly changing ecosystem, and the Southern Ocean marine environment generally.
This report is intended to initiate the development of a marine protected area plan for Domain 9. It outlines available data and existing conservation planning approaches for MPA development in the Southern Oceans, presents a range of conservation objectives, outlines known conservation values, socioeconomic values and threats, reviews current progress toward protection of these values, highlights remaining conservation gaps, and identifies the next steps in a conservation planning process.
