Charles Darwin Foundation calls for increased protection of at-risk species

Puerto Ayora, April 24th 2009

Charles Darwin Foundation (CDF) scientists, together with representatives from International Center for the Investigation of the El Niño Phenomenon (CIIFEN), University of San Francisco, Quito, North Carolina State University and National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) wrapped up the Galapagos Climate Change Workshop this Thursday with a strong warning about the dangers of an altered climate. Speaking before a stakeholder panel including representatives from the Ministry of the Environment, Galapagos National Park, Agrocalidad, the Ecuadorian Navy (INOCAR) and other governmental agencies, CDF oceanographer Stuart Banks joined experts from around the world in announcing that climate change presents the risk of significant disruptions in currents, surface ocean temperature, and precipitation in the Galapagos archipelago. Further, he warned, such changes have the potential to increase the spread of invasive species and disease, and to exacerbate existing stresses upon many native and endemic species.

During the weeklong conference, convened jointly by Conservation International (CI), the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the Ministry of the Environment, Galapagos National Park and the CDF as part of an inter-institutional effort financed by WWF and CI, experts in terrestrial and marine ecosystems and climatologists conferred about these and other threats that climate change could pose to natural systems in Galapagos, and outlined measures to adapt to them.

Chief among those actions will be expanded monitoring of at-risk species, which will build on the current data-gathering programs of the Park and CDF to act as an "early warning system" for the effects of climate change. This data could be used to inform targeted changes in regulation of the Park and Marine Reserve, especially during El Niño/La Niña years, whose extreme highs and lows have become more extreme over the last decades. Participants also urged new species-specific management techniques, such as protecting penguin feeding zones from fishing and transmission of invasive species and diseases.

At the heart of all of these measures, participants stressed, was a need to strengthen the resilience of many species as a buttress against unpredictable changes. A report of the conference, along with relevant research, will be published in a forthcoming special edition of "Galapagos Research", a peer-reviewed journal of the CDF.

Further Information:
Ivonne Guzmán
cdfinfo@fcdarwin.org.ec
www.darwinfoundation.org