NZ Herald: An eye on marine life

New Zealand scientists have been involved in a 10-year long census of the ocean’s biodiversity, which found that most marine species have still to be discovered.

Associate Professor Mark Costello (Auckland University) co-authored a paper which brought together the findings of the 25 regional reports from the census – the paper highlighted some of the threats to marine biodiversity, including habitat loss, overfishing and pollution as major threats.

An excerpt: (read in full here)

“Costello says scientists will continue to add information to the census database. He says knowledge to date has come largely from work that countries were already funding, so it should continue.

“What the census did was introduce international collaboration and lend co-ordination to marine biodiversity research.

“Project funds allowed scientists to meet and helped to build an open-access database, the Ocean Biogeographic Information System (Obis), which will continue to grow.”