OUR efforts to conserve the oceans lag 100 years behind those designed to protect plants and animals on land. While over a tenth of the Earth鈥檚 land surface lies within national parks, less than one per cent of coastal zones are protected. And the 鈥渉igh seas鈥� enjoy virtually no protection at all.
The stark message comes from the organisers of the most audacious attempt yet to document the diversity of marine life. The 10-year Census of Marine Life (CoML) aims to identify the marine equivalents of land-based biodiversity hotspots such as the Amazon rainforest. 快猫短视频s hope this will help policy makers decide where to site new marine protected areas. Yet so far, only around one-twentieth of the world鈥檚 oceans have been explored biologically, says Jesse Ausubel, project director of CoML for the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, based in New York.
Launched in 2000, the census involves more than 300 scientists from 53 countries. Last week, it produced its first preliminary report, which if anything is a statement of just how little we know about marine life. The census has been discovering new fish species at a rate of around three per week, and the researchers expect to add another 2000 to 3000 fish species to the database by 2010. Researchers expect to catalogue 2 million marine species in all. Only around a tenth are known to science. 鈥淥ne has to be humble when you鈥檙e dealing with an environment that large,鈥� says Ausubel.
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One surprise has been the extraordinary biodiversity in the sediments covering the vast plains on the ocean floor. 快猫短视频s assumed these were monotonous, lifeless environments, but one survey off the coast of Angola found an area more diverse than any other aquatic environment. Eighty per cent of species sampled were new to science.
IUCN, the world conservation union, hopes to designate five new marine protected areas on the high seas by 2008. Kristina Gjerde, an expert on maritime law and policy advisor to IUCN, says that the census will provide vital scientific information on which areas deserve protecting. 鈥淭he missing gap for all of this has been the scientific basis,鈥� she says.