David Attenborough’s Ocean director urges Australia to strengthen marine protections
The creator of David Attenborough’s latest documentary says it’s the legendary broadcaster’s most personal work yet – and his message could not be more relevant to Australia.
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The creator of David Attenborough’s latest documentary says Australia must urgently act to protect more of its oceans if it hopes to save our wildlife, key industries, and maintain a healthy planet into the future.
UK director and producer Toby Nowlan said his film Ocean with David Attenborough was the legendary English broadcaster’s “most emotional, reflective and personal piece yet”.
The feature-length documentary was released in May on Mr Attenborough’s 99th birthday, with a star-studded premiere attended by King Charles.
Mr Nowlan was in Darwin recently and told this publication Attenborough’s message “couldn’t be more relevant for Australia”.
“For almost 100 years he’s been showing us the natural world, and he’s drawing it all together for this epic, conclusive piece to say there is nowhere more important on Earth than the ocean,” Mr Nowlan said.
“If we save the sea, we save our world.
“Australia is in this amazing position, because it’s got one of the most diverse coastlines on the planet … there’s a lot at stake, and there’s a lot to celebrate.”
The documentary showcases oceans across the globe, including a mass coral bleaching event on the Great Barrier Reef and blue whales migrating through Western Australia’s Geographe Bay.
Some of the film’s most confronting imagery exposes the impact of bottom trawlers, a method of fishing that involves dragging nets along the sea bed, often capturing large amounts of bycatch and damaging marine habitats in the process.
Trawling is common practice in Australian fisheries, but one in which the impact is often invisible to both fishers and consumers.
“Bottom trawling is happening across the planet thousands of times every day – a process as common as ploughing on land, but as damaging as bulldozing your local ancient woodland,” Mr Nowlan said.
“And the reason is that people haven’t seen it clearly, it’s happening out of sight, out of mind, hidden from view below the waves.
“That’s the power of film, I think, is to tell more and more of these stories.”
Scientists agree we must protect at least 30 per cent of the world’s oceans by 2030 to have a chance of stemming the dual crises of biodiversity loss and climate change.
Environment Minister Murray Watt reaffirmed Australia’s commitment to the 30 by 30 target at the UN Ocean Conference in France last month, raising expectations the federal government will ban trawling, fishing and drilling in more marine parks.
More than half of the country’s waters have now been declared marine protected areas, but only 22 per cent have a level of protection that bans extractive activities.
Mr Nowlan said witnessing the resilience of the ocean meant he came away from filming “filled with hope”.
“That was the most exciting thing … this amazing dawning realisation that the process of recovery in the ocean is really different to the process of recovery on land,” he said.
“In the ocean, if you seal off an area it fills up with life way more quickly, in a much more spectacular way.
“If we just protect a third of the ocean as a bare minimum, so much of the ocean will just fill up with life again, and we can live in a world that has more fish and bigger coastal economies and more marine life than anyone has ever dreamt possible. And that’s amazing, that’s a win for everyone – conservationists and fisheries alike.”
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