Facts
& Figures
• Under the United
Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, Australia has rights and
responsibilities over some 16 million km2 of ocean – more than
twice the area of the Australian continent.
• Growth in marine industries of eight per cent per annum has been recorded
in recent years. At the last major review it was estimated that our
marine industries might well be valued annually at between $50 billion
and $85 billion by the year 2020.
•
Australia’s unique marine environments contain: the world’s
largest areas and highest species diversity of tropical and temperate
seagrasses; some of the largest areas of coral reefs; the highest diversity
of mangrove species; exceptional levels of biodiversity for a wide
range of marine invertebrates; and high levels of endemism in our temperate
and sub-Antarctic waters.
•
Australia’s marine environments are under increas-ing pressure
from threats such as unsustainable fishing; introduced marine pests
and diseases; unsustainable tourism and recreation; climate change;
pollution and sedimentation; and some forms of mining.
•
The living marine environment is like a chain with many links – if
one is broken, an entire species may disappear. Every species plays
an important role in maintaining healthy ecosystems and the loss of
biodiversity weakens the entire natural system.
•
Australia’s submission to the UN Commission on the Limits of
the Continental Shelf, due by 2004, is expected to claim more than
4 million km2 of seabed and subsoil in the high seas – well beyond
our Exclusive Economic Zone, which ends 200 nautical miles from the
shoreline.
• Australia has a land mass of 7.7 million km2. Our EEZ, which under
the 1982 UN Law of the Sea convention gives the Commonwealth government
sole rights over the water, the seabed and subsoil, covers 8.6 million
km2.
•
71 per cent of the earth’s surface is covered by ocean.
• The oceans contain an estimated 1370 million cubic kilometres of water.
•
The surface of Venus – millions of kilometres away and hidden
by clouds of sulphuric acid – has been better mapped than the
Earth’s sea bed.
•
It’s been estimated that the deep sea may contain as many as
10 million species that have not yet been described or named.
• Six out of every 10 humans live in coastal regions.
• 80 per cent of Australians live and work within 50 kilometres of the
coastline.
• The Great Barrier Reef extends for 2000 kilometres and is visible from
the Moon.
• The largest ocean is the Pacific, followed by the Atlantic and the
Indian.
•
More than half of the world’s animal groups are found only in
the sea.
• There are more species of fish than mammals, reptiles and birds combined.
•
Fish (fin and shell) are the world’s largest single source of
animal protein, exceeding production of beef, sheep, poultry or eggs.
•
Marine animals have a highly developed system of chemical communication – many
featuring receptors which enable them to detect food or predators from
a considerable distance.
• Southern Bluefin Tuna travel thousands of kilometres during migration
and can achieve speed bursts of up to 70 kilometres per hour.
• More than 1500 new species have been discovered in Australian waters
in the past 10 years.
• Australia is home to more than half of the shark and ray species in
the world.
• 98 per cent of species found in the oceans live on or in the bottom.
• An estimated 3.36 million Australians, aged 5 years or older, went
recreational fishing at least once during the year 2001-2002, representing
a national recreational fishing participation rate of 19.5%.
•
Commercial whaling during the last century decimated most of the world’s
whale population. Estimates suggest that between 1925, when the first
whaling factory ship was introduced, and 1975, more than 1.5 million
whales were killed. Whalers hunted one whale population after another,
moving from species to species as populations declined from exploitation.
After repeated requests from the world community, the International
Whaling Commission (IWC) agreed to a moratorium on commercial whaling
that came into effect in 1986.
• Between 200 and 400 introduced marine species, including the Northern
Pacific seastar, European shore crab and Japanese kelp, are believed
to inhabit Australian waters.
•
An estimated 10,000 marine species are transported in ships’ ballast
water between bio-geographic regions at any given moment worldwide.
•
A new introduced species becomes established every three to six months
in Australia’s busy Port Phillip Bay in Victoria.
•
Between 1997 and 1999, Port Phillip Bay’s Northern Pacific seastar
population increased from negligible to 30 million and is now estimated
at around 100 million.
• In 2002 the Great Barrier Reef experienced a mass bleaching event that
was more severe than the event of 1998, making the bleaching event
of 2002 the worst ever recorded for the GBR.
• Every day ships throughout the world throw 5.5 million items of waste
overboard.
•
Three times more rubbish is dumped into the world’s oceans as
the weight of fish caught annually.
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