World's rarest porpoise gets no help from UNESCO
The world's rarest and most endangered porpoise, the vaquita, have been pushed closer to extinction by the UNESCO World Heritage Committee. The vaquita, whose numbers now total fewer than 30 left on the planet, are set to vanish from the Gulf of California as UNESCO postponed an "in danger" listing for Mexico's Islands and Protected Areas of the Gulf of California World Heritage Site - their home.
The vaquita have been in decline for decades due to the hazards presented by gillnet fishing gear set to catch shrimp and other species in the Gulf of California According to the Center for Biological Diversity, which has been petitioning the World Heritage Committee to list the site as "in danger" since 2015, the vaquita will be extinct by 2021 if current rates of decline continue. The Gulf of California site was granted World Heritage status in 2005, in part to protect the vaquita.
“Given the increasingly dire situation facing the vaquita, the UNESCO delay could mean the loss of this unique species,” said D.J. Schubert, a wildlife biologist at the Animal Welfare Institute who is attending the Committee’s meeting in Bahrain this week. “It’s absolutely critical that the committee and the International Union for Conservation of Nature see to it that Mexico goes beyond empty rhetoric and takes all actions necessary to save the vaquita before it’s too late.”
This is the second time UNESCO has postponed making an “in danger” decision on this site. In 2017 the committee granted Mexico’s request to delay a decision for the Gulf of California site for one year to allow Mexico to improve vaquita protections. Today the WHC opted again to ignore the vaquita’s plight and decided not even to discuss an “in danger” designation despite the porpoise’s population likely being reduced by about half since the committee’s last meeting, jeopardizing its very existence.
In 2015 the AWI and Center for Biological Diversity petitioned the World Heritage Committee to list the site as “in danger” because of the decline of the vaquita and the totoaba, a large, critically endangered fish. Vaquita experts have found that despite the Mexican government’s recent regulatory actions, the vaquita’s decline continued “unabated” last year.
“Delaying the in-danger designation could be a death sentence for these desperately imperiled porpoises,” said Alejandro Olivera, the Center for Biological Diversity’s Mexico representative, also attending the Committee’s meeting in Bahrain this week. “The Mexican government bought more time to avoid acting to save the vaquitas, which have nearly vanished on President Peña Nieto’s watch. By delaying these crucial safeguards, UNESCO is letting the current president off the hook for failing to save these porpoises.”
According to World Heritage Committee guidelines, a site qualifies as “in danger” if a species for which a site was protected suffers a “serious decline.” A recent report on the site by the World Heritage Centre and International Union for Conservation of Nature acknowledges that illegal fishing nets continue to be found in the vaquita’s waters.
As part of an ongoing effort to urge the Mexican government to rigorously enforce laws to protect the rapidly disappearing species, AWI, Center members and others plan to rally on July 5 beginning at 8 a.m. outside the Mexican Embassy in Washington, D.C. Held in conjunction with International Save the Vaquita Day, the rally is one of several happening across the world next week. For more information on the D.C. rally, visit https://awionline.org/action-ealerts/awis-annual-rally-save-vaquita.
Read the 2015 petition to protect the home of the vaquita, HERE.