Hon Steve Maharey

Minister of Research, Science & Technology

3 July 2007 Speech
Royal Society/Antarctica New Zealand Conference

Introduction – Ministerial visit to the ice

It is a pleasure to be able to be here to open this conference celebrating 50 years of New Zealand's involvement in Antarctica. Before I go on to talk a little more about this involvement and what it means to New Zealand, I want to talk a little about my own introduction to Antarctica. I know many of you have a long and distinguished link with Antarctica through your science and other roles. My own practical link to Antarctica is shorter, less distinguished, but nevertheless, immensely memorable.

As a Member of Parliament and a Minister I am invited to many functions and to do many things. It’s always a challenge to balance my diary conflicts and prioritise engagements. I must say that I didn’t have this problem though, when I got Lou’s letter of invitation to visit Antarctica in November 2006.

My visit in November last year gave me a first hand appreciation of New Zealand's presence in Antarctica and how we are working closely with our American counterparts. We travelled to and from the ice in American aircraft which are part of the joint logistics pool with New Zealand.

While I was on the ice, I was fortunate to be able to visit some of the science programmes that were underway, the historic huts, the spectacular Dry Valleys and the US station at McMurdo.

I was privileged to be able to visit Scott’s hut at Cape Evans and see those heroic events of almost 100 years ago frozen in time. I found it a surprisingly moving experience just to be there.

The place of science in Antarctica was enshrined by the Antarctica Treaty in 1959. But the important role of science in Antarctica was foreshadowed by the early explorers like Scott. He set up one corner of his hut at Cape Evans as a laboratory almost 50 years earlier, and his meteorological station on the hill just above the hut was in some ways a precursor to the climate and atmospheric studies that are taking place on the ice today.

I did take the opportunity of getting a bit of fishing in – for science of course. We didn’t need extra food for dinner as the food at Scott Base is excellent.

The NIWA team use a slightly bigger fishing line to make sure that their divers don’t get away, and they did get their diver back.

The Dry Valleys are spectacular at all scales. From the small rocks shaped by wind, to the mountains, ice and hanging glaciers and frozen lakes. It was interesting too to see the long-term ecological research programme being undertaken there by American scientists.

The big science event for New Zealand last season was of course Andrill. It embodies the true Antarctica collaboration between nations and also the “can do” Kiwi spirit. It is a great example of international collaboration supported by excellent science from New Zealand and other nations.

Andrill is managed by Antarctica New Zealand with Dr Tim Naish helping lead the science. New Zealand, the United States, Germany and Italy are all partners in Andrill. During my visit I was able to visit the drilling site just as the first cores were being brought to the surface. I must say that I was humbled by the ability of the drilling team to drill through the Ross Ice Shelf, drop the drill through strong currents in a kilometre of ocean and extract more than 1200 metres of core from the sediments below for scientific study. All I can say is well done to Alex Pyne and the drilling team.

I was also privileged to meet and talk with a group of almost 60 scientists at McMurdo while they waited for the first section of rock core to arrive from the drilling site. I could feel their sense of anticipation and excitement as they prepared to see the core for the first time, and to find out what it was going to tell them about the earth’s climate history.

Of course after all these travels we returned to Scott Base. I found the base a very real part of New Zealand on the Southern Continent. It operates in a good Kiwi way and also reflects the physical presence of the territorial claim that New Zealand has had to the Ross Dependency since 1923.

Scott Base is also an exemplar of sustainability in action. There is a very strong focus on sustainability at all levels, both at the base and in the science events that it supports. This focus is necessary to protect the pristine Antarctic environment. But the “sustainability first” paradigm is also something that we need to replicate in mainland New Zealand to help us meet the environmental challenges we face.

In the past 50 years New Zealand has been engaged in science programmes involving the sea, the land, the ice, the biota, the atmosphere and the human presence in Antarctica. Science has an important place in Antarctica, both for the knowledge it gives us and also the role it plays in the Antarctic Treaty System.

Like many other Antarctic Treaty nations, New Zealand’s presence in Antarctica is firmly based on strong science programmes. The work we undertake there has a range of outcomes beyond those we sometimes expect of science.

- Science allows us to play our part in supporting the Antarctic Treaty system in areas such as the managing of toothfish stocks.

- Environmental science helps us to manage the human impacts from both science and tourism on the pristine Antarctic environment.

- Past and present climate science helps us understand probably the greatest challenge that faces mankind today – the impact of climate change on the environment, economies and people of the world.

- Leadership and collaboration in science programmes in Antarctica shows New Zealand's commitment to the careful stewardship of the Ross Dependency.

- Science helps us conserve the historic heritage of the heroic age of Antarctic exploration in the early years of the 20th Century.

- The 50-year Antarctic science relationship with the US has been an enduring and ongoing commitment to working together by both our nations.

- And media stories and films about Antarctic science allow all people with an interest in the frozen continent to understand more about this special world which everyone knows about, but few are fortunate enough to visit.

Overall then, science is an important currency with which New Zealand and many other countries show their commitment to the ongoing protection of Antarctica through the Antarctic Treaty system.

Given the importance of Antarctic science the Government was delighted to support International Polar Year (IPY). IPY is a once in a career opportunity for international collaboration in science to better understand the unique physical and natural environments of the Arctic and Antarctic.

Research programmes for IPY have been summarised in the “honeycomb” diagram of science projects covering the Arctic, the Antarctic and both poles. Given that I spend most of my day working in the Beehive, the diagram has a rather familiar feel.

The New Zealand Government believed that it was important for New Zealand scientists to be part of this international collaboration. In May this year the Prime Minister, Helen Clark, announced that the Government was going to spend a total of $11m over three years on Antarctic research that forms part of the IPY projects. I am pleased to be able to say that I supported this budget initiative – so Lou it must have been a good investment on your part to take me down to the ice last season.

$3.6 million of this budget funding will enable NIWA’s research vessel Tangaroa to make a voyage in early 2008 to collect information and specimens of the marine biodiversity of the Ross Sea, as part of the Census of Antarctic Marine Life or “CAML”.

A further $3 million over three years will allow identification and analysis of the marine specimens and information collected.

The third part of the funding is $4.5 million over three years in the form of a contestable fund for research programmes that contribute to some of the IPY projects that you saw in the IPY honeycomb.

This is new funding and is in addition to all of the other Antarctica research that is being carried out under other research funding arrangements.

Relationships and collaboration

Before I go on, I want to make special mention of the important 50-year science relationship that New Zealand has had with the United States in Antarctica. This relationship extends from the physical presence of the US Antarctic programme in Christchurch, to the logistics pool to get people and supplies to and from and around the ice, to collaborations in research programmes on the ice. And it extends too, to the international arena, and the support of the Antarctic Treaty System and to our broader science links with the National Science Foundation.

It is a testament to the commitment of the scientists, the National Antarctic programmes, and the governments of New Zealand and the United States, that this close collaboration in Antarctica has endured from the cold war era of the 1950’s through to the present time.

This conference celebrates the last 50 years on the ice since the International Geophysical Year in 1957/58. An immense amount of knowledge has been gained from science on the ice in that time. What is particularly interesting is what the research in Antarctica is telling us about global systems and about the dramatic influence that Antarctica has on the world’s climate and oceans today.

These are big issues that challenge all of us today and will continue to do so into the foreseeable future. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has told us that evidence for the warming of the global climate system is unequivocal, and that they are confident this has been caused by human activity. That is a pretty clear message. But will it still be the same scale of challenge in 50 years time? Or will it be different?

As well as being a time to reflect on the last 50 exciting years of Antarctica science, it’s also perhaps a time to reflect on what a similar conference in 50 years time might be discussing. What will the keynote speakers be saying at Antarctica New Zealand's 2057 conference which is celebrating 100 years on the ice?

My sincere hope is that by 2057 we will have recognised the critical challenge of climate change and taken the bold steps necessary to address it, both here in New Zealand and internationally. If that is the case, the 2057 conference might be discussing many of the same topics as this conference. If we don’t step up to this challenge, there may need to be new conference themes addressing things like the new freshwater ecosystems, the vascular plants, and the butterflies and moths of Antarctica.

What this all means is that Antarctic science has never been more relevant. The knowledge we gain from it is critical to our understanding of past, current and future global processes. Science is a long-term investment and I’m pleased to see that the results of 50 years of New Zealand's investment in Antarctic science will be thoroughly discussed during this conference.

Thank you for the opportunity to open this important conference. My best wishes for a successful and interesting four days.

ENDS

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