Aquatic Environment and Biodiversity Annual Review 2012

AEBAR 2012: Marine Biodiversity
A new report was launched in 2010 by the United Nations on ocean acidification 59 Among other
findings, the study shows that increasing ocean acidification will mean that by 2100 some 70% of
cold water corals, (a key refuge and feeding ground for some commercial fish species), will be
exposed to corrosive waters (see also Tracey et al. 2011). In addition, given the current greenhouse
gas emission rates, it is predicted that the surface water of the highly productive Arctic Ocean will
become under-saturated with respect to essential carbonate minerals by the year 2032, and the
Southern Ocean by 2050 with disruptions to large components of the marine food source, in particular
those calcifying species, such as foraminifera, pteropods, coccolithophores, which rely on calcium
carbonate.
Emerging research suggests that many of the effects of ocean acidification on marine organisms and
ecosystems will be variable and complex and will affect different species in different ways. Evidence
from naturally acidified locations confirms, however, that although some species may benefit,
biological communities in acidified seawater conditions are less diverse and calcifying (calciumreliant)
species are absent whereas algae tend to dominate.
Many questions remain regarding the biological and biogeochemical consequences of ocean
acidification for marine biodiversity and ecosystems, and the impacts of these changes on ecosystems
and the services they provide, for example, in fisheries, coastal protection, tourism, carbon
sequestration and climate regulation.
Studies to predict changes in biodiversity in relation to climate change in more than a rudimentary
way are beyond the state of current knowledge in New Zealand. Nevertheless, surveys of biodiversity
that have occurred or are planned will provide a snapshot against which future research results or
trends can be compared.
Meeting the challenges of climate change and identifying crucial issues for marine biodiversity is an
area of high political interest internationally 60 and has been identified as a gap in biodiversity research
in New Zealand 61
Projects
ZBD2005-05 Long-term effects of climate variation and human impacts on the structure and
functioning of New Zealand shelf ecosystems.
This is a large scale project to investigate changes in shelf ecosystems over a 1000 year timescale
to provide context and perspective on issues of natural variation versus human impacts on
marine biodiversity.
The project is a multidisciplinary study to collate and sythesise paleoecological, archaeological,
historical, and contemporary data relating to changes in the structure and functioning of New
Zealand shelf ecosystems since human arrival about 750 years ago. The data have been used to
model present and four past states of the Hauraki Gulf ecosystem over the last 1000 years.
The project is collaborating with the international History of Marine Animal Populations (HMAP)
project, itself a part of the Census of Marine Life (CoML) programme. A short video about the
NZ Taking Stock project was made by HMAP staff and is currently available on the HMAP
website http://hmapcoml.org/projects/nz/.
59
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=36941&Cr=emissions&Cr1 Downloadable Report The
Environmental Consequences of Ocean Acidification
60
http://biodiversity-l.iisd.org/news/ungas-second-committee-considers-biodiversity-and-sustainabledevelopment/
61
Green, W.; Clarkson, B. (2006). Review of the New Zealand Biodiversity Strategy Themes
266