subject: Tourists Shaping Antarctic Environment Adversely [print this page] Despite Antarctica's ice, snow, isolation, high winds and raging seas and for hardy types, precisely for these reasons, the continent will be visited by an estimated 11,200 people this tourist season, all but about 130 of them on cruise ships. Despite the fact that this year saw only 400 times more people as compared to the tourists season last year, the fact remains that this is still 70 percent higher than the tourist seasons before it, specifically 6,585 of them. The same sentiments of those watching over Antarctica go to its environmental state, and they all see a steady stream of tourists, specifically by the thousands in the years to come.
A round trip ticket to where people mostly start their Antarctic trip, Tierra Del Fuego in Ushuaia Argentina, along with a twenty thousand dollar cruise plus a 14 day cruise that costs a hefty six to seven thousand dollars is the cost that any Antarctic traveler will have to be ready for.
Today's nature experts maintain that Antarctica is not invincible the way people perceive it thanks to its tough climate and geography, along with the high cost of getting there for the throng of tourists grow every single year, posing a large threat to the ecosystem of this frozen kingdom.The distinguished director of the Antarctic Project said that while he is all for people seeing the great beauty of Antarctica, there must be a cap on the number of visitors per year and a strong limit on exploiting new sites.
Forty various countries containing 200 or more environmental teams use this as their secretariat for the Washington based initiative. Despite the fact that most visitors swear to uphold conservation efforts in Antarctica, it is still not good to have so many of them coming in all the time, and falling too much for this fragile continent.A major concern of this director, who favors a limit of 6,000 visitors a year, is that most tourists visit the same few places on the 800 mile long Antarctic Peninsula, which has the continent's biggest concentration of penguins, seals and birds.
But on one specific occasion at a time, it is extremely rare that visitors setting foot on land go beyond a hundred people. It is so bad that animals get disrupted when there are visitors for they cannot get food for themselves or for their young and they are also not able to rest.
Even science is uncertain if there will be a long term repercussion, she avers. Tourists touching the plants and leaving garbage behind are among the growing concerns. By reinforcing the Antarctic Treaty, we understand why when travelers go ashore, large and experienced staffs make sure they have very little impact if none at all, and this also sheds light as to why most tour operators abide by such environmental guidelines.
Agreements from the 1959 Antarctic Treaty, which was agreed on by 43 countries hand in hand with the January 14, 1998 environmental protocol put a stop to mining and oil drilling, along with safety measures for the environment that limits fishing trips and occasional cruises throughout the geography of the White Continent.The association of tour members, which is based in New York, saw to it that they all adopted the 100 person limit for shore visits, also employing zodiacs, which are motorized rubber boats for good reasons. Of the 15 vessels in Antarctica this season, nine fly Russian flags.
Tour operators smiled during the break up of the Soviet Union as a motley of smaller ships became accessible for them. All of these vessels can resist strong ice with their hardened hulls especially the icebreaker, and these can take in as much as 40 to 80 people. But it is obvious that the environmental problems of the frozen continent makes many so concerned. We can only wait for the day in the future when, looking back, we would be so relieved that our worries were in vain. But even as we are raring to visit this beautiful continent, let us restrain ourselves until science brings the answers.
