Chill-seekers face Antarctic tourism curbs

MADRID - Tourism in Antarctica faces curbs under measures being considered by the countries which control activities in the world's last great wilderness.

"We just can't leave it to industry to regulate, we have to deal with it ourselves," Australian delegation head Tony Press said, summarising a two-week meeting of Antarctic Treaty nations which ended last week.

The tour operators who ferry thousands of people to the Antarctic's harsh, dramatic landscapes and its unique wildlife formed their own self-regulatory body in 1991, the International Association of Antarctic Tour Operators.

But the number of visitors to the frozen continent is rising rapidly.

About 22,000 people are expected to travel to see penguins, seals, icebergs and glaciers next year, compared with annual figures of around 5000 in the early 1990s, says Trevor Hughes, director of New Zealand's Antarctic policy unit.

New Zealand is at the forefront of moves to limit tourism.

Mr Hughes said Antarctic Treaty nations agreed the tourist operators' association members had done a good job in promoting high standards, but more stringent regulation was needed.

"New and bigger operators are coming in. Thousand-passenger vessels ... full of heavy bunker oil." Tourism is now becoming the major human activity in Antarctica and the treaty parties need to take responsibility for its more active and effective management and regulation."

One of the points agreed on in Madrid by the parties to the 44-year-old Antarctic Treaty was for Norway to host a meeting of experts early next year to examine the impact of tourism on the Antarctic environment.

The New Zealanders also raised the dangers of "adventure tourism", in which people embark on often highly dangerous expeditions in Antarctica.

"We have to send people out to risk their lives to rescue people ... You can't categorically say you have to ban this or that, but everything has to be looked at individually," Mr Hughes said.

Another area of debate was environmental liability in the event of an ecological disaster, such as a major oil spill.

- REUTERS