The White House announced today that President Barack Obama will expand the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument off the coast of Hawaii, creating the world’s largest marine protected area.
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While many World Bank watchers expect Mr Kim to be reappointed, given the seven-decade tradition of choosing an American picked by the United States, the bank’s largest contributor, they say he will have to work to solidify support.
After the expansion, the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, originally established by former President George W. Bush in 2006 to preserve the marine area of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, will contain about 582,578 square miles and become the world’s largest marine protected area.
During his nearly eight years in the White House, Obama has protected more square kilometers (square miles) of land and sea than any other president in the history of the United States. That is more than twice the size of the American state of Texas. The expanded area, including the archipelago and its adjacent waters, is considered a sacred place for the Native Hawaiian community.
Native Hawaiians urged for the monument’s expansion back in January and consider the place a “the boundary between Ao, the world of light and the living, and Pō, the world of the gods and spirits from which all life is born and to which ancestors return after death”, according to the White House.
The designation bans commercial fishing and any new mining, as is the case within the existing monument.
With a permit, recreational fishing is allowed.
“We’re obviously going up against environmental organizations that have billions of dollars”, said Sean Martin, the president of the Hawaii Longline Association. Hawaii’s longline fishing fleet supplies much of the fresh tuna and other fish to Hawaii.
He said he was “disappointed” by Hawaiian Governor David Ige’s decision to support the expansion.
The regional council that manages USA waters in the Pacific Islands said the decision “serves a political legacy” rather than a conservation benefit. It also says the move will protect and improve the environment. At almost three-and-a-half times the size of California, the monument is now the world’s largest protected area. The battle marked a major shift in the war.
President Obama, who marked the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service by designating a whole new land monument in ME, is giving oceans some love, too. USA presidents were granted the executive authority to designation land as protected regions under the 1906 Antiques Act, which states: “the President of the United States is hereby authorized, in his discretion, to declare by public proclamation historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest”.
But Hawaiian Senator Schatz, who worked on a compromise plan to accommodate certain types of fishing and more Native Hawaiian involvement in managing the preserve, said there would be plenty of fish left for longline fishermen in other areas.
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The federal government will give Hawaii’s Department of Natural Resources and its Office of Hawaiian Affairs a greater role in supervising the monument.
