Now, in an unprecedented attempt to stop this from happening, two NGOs \u2013 BirdLife South Africa and Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds \u2013 have taken South Africa\u2019s minister of forestry, fisheries and the environment, Barbara Creecy, to court claiming she has failed to implement \u201cbiologically meaningful closures\u201d to fishing around six penguin colonies which are home to 76% of the global African penguin population.<\/p>\n
The decision to petition the courts came after the minister chose not to follow some of the key recommendations made by an international review panel she appointed.<\/p>\n
Alistair McInnes, who heads up the Seabird Conservation Programme at BirdLife South Africa and is the author of the founding affidavit in the court papers, says that the desired fishing bans would apply only to commercial vessels using purse-seine nets to target small pelagic [open seas] species such as sardines and anchovies. Purse-seine nets are like giant drawstring bags that target entire shoals. African penguins are specialist feeders and predominantly eat these species \u2013 and South Africa\u2019s sardine and anchovy stocks are at all-time lows.<\/p>\n
Penguins are not the only ones who stand to benefit from such a ban. Cape cormorants (another endangered bird species) also feed predominantly on small pelagic fish. And small-scale handline fishers have welcomed the proposals, as many of the species they target feed on sardines and anchovies.<\/p>\n
The panel of experts appointed by Creecy delivered a report in July 2023, stating that targeted fishing closures around penguin colonies \u201cwould be likely to benefit penguin conservation\u201d.<\/p>\n
While the minister took some of the report\u2019s recommendations on board, she stuck with existing, but more limited, closures.<\/p>\n
In the Stony Point colony, for example, the area closed to purse-seine fishing is three times smaller than it would be if the expert panel\u2019s recommendations were followed \u2013 so it\u2019s little wonder that Penguin 999.000000007425712 is having a hard time finding food. And it\u2019s a similar situation in three other colonies where 50% or less of the penguins\u2019 core foraging area is protected under existing rules.<\/p>\n The potential impact of extended fishing closures on the purse-seine industry is hard to quantify, but the body representing fishers says the court action is misguided. \u201cContrary to environmental NGOs\u2019 statements in the media that the main driver is the purse-seine fishing industry, the impact of fishing [on penguin numbers] is small,\u201d the South African pelagic fishing industry association said in an email to the Guardian. It said the \u201cenvironmental NGOs\u201d had delayed a \u201cprocess that is tasked with establishing what are the main drivers causing the decline in penguin numbers\u201d.<\/p>\n Creecy\u2019s office did not respond to requests for comment and the \u201crecord of decision\u201d, which the state attorney representing the minister filed in April gave little insight into why she followed some of the panel\u2019s recommendations and did not apply others.<\/p>\n Fishing is not the only driver of population declines. \u201cAfrican penguins are probably the most studied seabird in Africa,\u201d says McInnes. \u201cLoads of research has been done into various threats to their survival.\u201d<\/p>\n These include the climate crisis (extreme heat and heavy rain can both prove disastrous during nesting season); land predators (leopards, caracals and honey badgers have all broken into colonies); and the localised threat of noise pollution from \u201cbunkering\u201d (a ship-to-ship refuelling process) at the St Croix colony near Gqeberha.<\/p>\n Nevertheless, prey availability is an important determining factor for the survival of any specialist predatory species, McInnes says, not to mention their ability to reproduce. It is perhaps telling that the only penguin colony in South Africa with a relatively stable population \u2013 Boulders near Cape Town \u2013 is in an area where purse-seine fishing has been banned for decades.<\/p>\n As McInnes, who has been studying the African penguin for more than a decade, says: \u201cI haven\u2019t met a penguin scientist who doesn\u2019t believe that carefully demarcated closures are part of the solution.\u201d<\/p>\n All Penguin 999.000000007425712 wants to know is where her next meal will come from.<\/p>\n