Pacific Remote Islands Monument rollback would be wrong

So much for “this land was made for you and me” — or in the case of the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument (PRIMNM), “this ocean.” U.S. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke has recommended that President Donald Trump open the area for commercial fishing. It’s shortsighted and would benefit only a select few.

Situated to the south and west of Hawaii, this collection of islands and atolls make up one of the last places on Earth with an unsullied, thriving ocean ecosystem. Picture an ocean-scape where reefs are covered with coral; dolphins, whales and turtles roam; large fish swarm in schools; sharks rule, and multiple species of sea birds forage. It’s a place you hope exists — and it does.

Keeping this area healthy benefits Hawaii. Just as we are connected to our brothers and sisters throughout the greater Pacific Basin, so is our ocean. Johnston Atoll has genetic and larval connectivity to Papahanaumokuakea’s French Frigate Shoals. Thus, PRIMNM serves as a “stepping stone” linking the otherwise fairly isolated Hawaiian Islands with other coral reef communities, which allows for colonization — and re-colonization after disturbance events like bleaching — of Hawaii’s reefs with a diverse fauna. This helps provide resilience that is critical to the survival of Hawaiian reef ecosystems.

Many Hawaiian descendants feel kuleana with the Pacific Remote Islands. Known as the Hui Panala‘au, 130 young Hawaiians were sent to the islands on occupation “tours” between 1935 until 1942. Two of these men, Richard Whaley and Joseph Keli‘ihananui, lost their lives on Howland Island in a Japanese attack on Dec. 8, 1941. The colonists allowed President Franklin Roosevelt to secure U.S. territorial claims to the islands.

President George W. Bush protected the ecosystem by creating the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument in 2009, and President Barack Obama saw fit to expand the boundaries in 2014. During the expansion’s public comment period, more than 1,500 Hawaii residents, as well as businesses, cultural practitioners, 200 scientists, the governor and over 135,000 U.S. citizens submitted letters and petitions to the administration in support.

It’s no surprise that the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council (“Wespac”) has been spearheading the effort to repeal the protections.

The Council argues that the longline industry needs the area, but its catch data proves otherwise. The Hawaii-based longline fleet reached its annual limit of 3,138 tons of bigeye tuna in August of this year. That’s right — the industry reached its quota in eight months, not 12, even with the waters of the monument closed to them.

But its rapacious harvest continues: the fleet has already caught another 1,000 tons of bigeye by buying the Northern Marianas’ quota. And now it’s continuing to fish by buying American Samoa’s. Sustainable this is not.

Unabashedly, Zinke is advising Trump to have Wespac manage fishing in the protection area, despite Wespac’s sorry history of failing to sustainably manage stocks. For example, it mismanaged the spiny lobster fishery in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, resulting in a complete decimation of the lobster stocks, which have yet to recover. Wespac hasn’t earned our trust to manage fisheries in the PRIMNM.

The world’s fisheries are already 90 percent fully exploited, over-exploited or depleted. Researchers tells us that by the end of the century, if carbon dioxide emissions continue to grow at the current pace, the ocean could become 150 percent more acidic.

To fend off catastrophe, leading marine scientists agree that at least 30 percent of the ocean needs to be set aside in marine reserves to protect fish populations and keep ecosystems healthy. With no residents and a thriving marine ecosystem, the Pacific Remote Islands is an ideal place for such protection.

The old song of our national pride rings true: “This land is your land.” It’s also our ocean — and it’s yours to protect.