After five years of compromises and failed negotiations, a landmark international agreement has been brokered between 24 countries and the European Union to create the world’s largest marine park in The Ross Sea, a deep bay in the Southern Ocean.
More than 1.5m sq km of the Ross Sea around Antarctica will be protected, and roughly 1.1m sq km of it will be set aside as a no-take “general protection zone”, where no fishing will be allowed.
This agreement came at the conclusion of two weeks discussions at the annual meeting of the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR).
