This Saturday's LAN Chile flight to the Falkland Islands (Malvinas) will bring together in Stanley environmentalists from several countries, including Chile, Brazil and Argentina, to participate in a workshop entitled, “Albatross and Petrels in the South Atlantic: Priorities and Conservation”.
The workshop, which will run from the 12th to the 15th of March, is hosted by Falklands Conservation, a non-governmental organization and sponsored by the Environmental Section of the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office's Overseas Territories Department, as well as by the Falkland Island Government.
The purpose of the workshop, as stated in the programme, is to "identify and agree priorities and develop outline work programmes (with associated resource requirements) to implement policy and practical ACAP (Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels) objectives for each UK Overseas Territory, relevant EEZs (Economic Exclusion Zones) and high seas areas and for metropolitan UK."
ACAP, is a multilateral agreement which seeks to conserve albatrosses and petrels by coordinating international activity to mitigate known threats to albatross and petrel populations. ACAP has been developed under the auspices of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS).
According to its own website, "ACAP is the first multilateral agreement which seeks an integrated and holistic approach to albatross and petrel conservation throughout the Southern Hemisphere. The Agreement provides a focus for international cooperation and exchange of information and expertise towards the conservation of these declining seabirds. It aims to establish an enhanced understanding of the conservation status of albatrosses and petrels and their susceptibility to a range of threats, both at sea and on land, as well as effective means of mitigating these threats."
Oli Yates, who heads Falkland Conservation's own study programme on albatrosses and petrels, under the auspices of ACAP, explained that Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, France, New Zealand, Peru, South Africa, Spain and the United Kingdom are all signatories to the Agreement. Falklands Conservation, as the local partners of Birdlife International, were glad that they were able to host the workshop, which would have as one of its major aims the agreement of a structure for the coordination of the efforts of the many countries, groups and individuals in the world, who were concerned at the plight of these magnificent ocean wanderers and working to improve it.
Albatrosses and petrels are among the most threatened birds in the world. ACAP claims a recent assessment indicates that the black-browed albatross, which breeds on the Falkland Islands and was once one of the world's commonest albatrosses, has declined by more than 40% in the last 30 years.
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