WWF Calls for strong environmental protection, less O&G for Arctic Ocean

January 2, 2019

Environmentalists warned that it is urgent that the Arctic Ocean be protected and critical that such protections are put in place soon. During a presentation at the Arctic Frontiers conference in Tromsø, Norway last month, Peter Winsor, Arctic program director at the World Wildlife Fund and an oceanography professor, said “When I started to study the Arctic 20 years ago it was a completely different Arctic,” and that because, “The Arctic is warming and losing sea ice, it is an unprecedented change and the way we deal with that is a big challenge”, in Ten to 20 years, the Arctic will be completely different.

In order to address the new open ocean coming to the Arctic, the WWF issued a report in 2018, on Blue Economy, calling for the creation of a pan-Arctic, ecologically coherent network of Marine Protected Areas. Many of the strategies in the report have also been discussed as part of the Arctic Council’s Protection of the Arctic Marine Environment working group.

Much of Winsor’s criticism during the conference was directed at Norway’s arctic policies: “The international target for protection of the Arctic Ocean is 10 percent, while Norway has protected only less than 1 percent. There is a disparity here” and pointed out that Russia has been far more active in protecting its Arctic territory.

[Norway wants to fight plastic pollution in the Arctic — and drill for more oil: https://www.arctictoday.com/norway-wants-to-fight-plastic-pollution-in-the-arctic-and-drill-for-more-oil/]

The Norwegian double policy of continued exploitation of the ocean while focusing it’s environmental policy on trash clean-up, is not well perceived by many in the arctic community.

According to Winsor “I would not say that the Norwegians are hypocritical; they are doing a lot of good things. But I am concerned that they still are pushing for development of non-renewable energy and extraction in Arctic”. “There is no way we can reach the IPCC goals of 1.5 degrees if we continue extracting oil”.

Photo by Bill Schmoker, Courtesy of ARCUS