[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George W. Bush (2008, Book II)]
[September 26, 2008]
[Pages 1244-1248]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]
Remarks on the United States Ocean Action Plan
September 26, 2008
Thank you all. Please sit down. Thank you, Secretary Clough, for the introduction. And congratulations on the
opening of the Sant Ocean Hall, which, by the way, opens tomorrow
morning at 11 o'clock. The Secretary and I just had a fabulous tour.
These
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exhibits in this hall will remind people that our oceans are vital for
our planet. This is going to heighten awareness of how important our
oceans are and that we have a solemn duty to protect them.
And so I've come not only to see the hall and to herald its opening,
but to spend a little time talking about ocean conservation. There are a
lot of people in this room who care about ocean conservation, and I
appreciate you working on--with us to help preserve a vital natural
resource.
First of all, I do want to recognize the Chancellor of the
Smithsonian Institute's Board of Regents--I call him the Chief Justice
of the Supreme Court--Justice Roberts,
thank you for coming. I appreciate very much the Sant family,
Roger and Vicki.
Roger turns out to be the Chairman of the Institute's Board of Regents
and a big supporter obviously of the Smithsonian; otherwise, they
probably wouldn't have named the hall for him. [Laughter] But thank you
for your generosity and your support.
Cristian Samper is the Director of the
Smithsonian Museum of Natural History, and he gave us a tour today. And
he's a knowledgeable fellow, a biologist, and he will make sure that
these exhibits remain relevant, you know, for the education of the
American people. And I want to thank you, Cristian, for your service.
I'm proud to be here with a member of my Cabinet, Carlos
Gutierrez, Department of Commerce, which
oversees NOAA, which had something to do with this facility. I want to
thank Congresswoman Madeleine Bordallo;
there she is. Madeleine, good to see you; thank you for coming. She is
from Guam. I appreciate the winners of the National Ocean Art Contest
who are here today; that would be you all. Yes.
I'm about to talk about some policy we've been implementing, and I
want to thank all those in the room for helping. There's a lot of folks
around the country and here in Washington who care deeply about the
oceans. And many of the organizations that have worked constructively
with our administration are here, and I thank you for your efforts,
because the truth of the matter is that we have got a good record
working with you. And I want to share some thoughts about it.
First of all, you got to know I like oceans. I didn't grow up in the
ocean--as a matter of fact--near the ocean--I grew up in the desert.
Therefore, it was a pleasant contrast to see the ocean. And I
particularly like it when I'm fishing. It turns out, it's a--I'm not the
first President liked to fish. It turns out, the first President really
liked to fish. George Washington--I was reading where he one time caught
100,000 herring in a single day. That's either a lot of fish or a lot of
fishing. [Laughter] But unlike that George W., I have not had that kind
of luck before. [Laughter]
America is a maritime nation. Obviously, the--protecting the oceans
are in our interest. It turns out that commercial and recreational
fishing add more than $76 billion to our economy every year. Seaport-
related businesses add an estimated $2 trillion in economic activity.
And the oceans are important for our economic--you know, as an economic
lifeline. They're important to our economy. Seas also offer limitless
opportunities for recreation and transportation and education and
research. It all adds up to the fact we got to be good stewards.
And so we developed what we've called the Ocean Action Plan. I'm a
guy who likes--when people walk into my office, I like to say, you know,
what are the specific steps, and how are we doing at achieving them?
This particular plan started off with 88 different points of action,
expectations; we've met 87 of them. When the Senate passes a treaty, we
will have met 88 of them. And it's--[applause].
Many of you in this room helped develop the plan. Many of you helped
implement the plan, and I thank you. The goal was to make our oceans,
coasts, and Great
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Lakes cleaner, healthier, and more productive. I want to spend a little
time talking about some of the successes.
Under the Ocean Action Plan, we've worked to stop overfishing. Last
year, I issued an Executive order protecting two of our Nation's most
popular game fish, striped bass and red drum. I signed important
legislation reauthorizing the Magnuson-Stevenson [Magnuson-Stevens]*
Act, which sets a firm deadline to end overfishing in America by 2011.
Many in this hall helped pass that piece of legislation, and I thank
you. Thanks to these and other efforts, we are beginning to see good
progress toward ending overfishing.
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*White House correction.
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At the beginning of my administration, 44 fish stocks were listed as
overfished. Today, almost half of those stocks are no longer on the
list. That's good news. Along the way, we've stepped up our efforts to
identify additional fish stocks that are at risk, and we're going to
take steps to protect them.
We're protecting and restoring vital wetland and marine habitats. In
2004, I set a goal of restoring, improving, and protecting 3 million
acres of interior and coastal wetlands in 5 years. And we met that goal
1 year ahead of schedule. This effort includes our watershed restoration
project in the Florida Everglades, which is the largest in the world.
During my administration, we have put two-thirds of Federal waters,
about 2.3 million square nautical miles, off limits to harmful bottom-
trawling and dredging. We care what happens in the oceans.
We made a special effort to protect the tropical forests of the sea,
coral reefs. Some of the most spectacular reefs are found in the
Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine National Monument, which I created
in June of 2006, thanks to the efforts of many in this hall. This
monument is the world's largest fully protected marine conservation
area, and it covers more than 7,000 marine species, a quarter of which
are found nowhere else on Earth.
We've promoted a culture of cooperative conservation. Through
programs like the Coastal America Partnership, we joined with State and
local governments, fishermen and tribal leaders and tens of thousands of
volunteers to improve conservation from the Great Lakes to the Gulf
Coast. One project, which is dear to my heart, is when folks from the
private sector helped to restore 10,000 acres of tidal wetlands in my
home State. For decades, this area could be the equivalent of a dust
bowl, just neglected. Today, it's a thriving ecosystem filled with
shorebirds and abundant fish.
Cooperative conservation works; it makes sense. It's a strategy
that's easy to implement when you find people willing to step up and do
their part.
We're increasing international cooperation to protect the ocean
environment that affects all nations. Through the Coral Triangle
Initiative, we're working with nations like Indonesia and Malaysia and
the Philippines and Australia to identify and eliminate the threats to
tropical reefs. President Yudhoyono
of Indonesia gets a lot of credit for this initiative. He is bound and
determined to protect coral reefs around his nation, and we are bound
and determined to help him do so by providing money, strategy,
expertise, and encouragement. At the United Nations, we succeeded in
passing a resolution to help protect fish stocks and marine habitats
from destructive fishing practices.
A lot of our citizens don't understand what's taking place in parts
of the world, but people use dynamite to fish, or they poison the fish
stocks in order to net them, or they use destructive bottom-trawling.
And we're using our influence to stop those kind of practices.
We're expanding ocean research. There is more left to learn about
the oceans; there's probably more to learn about the oceans than we need
to learn about the
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Moon--or that we know about the Moon. And so to help unlock these
mysteries, we've launched a 10-year Ocean Research Priorities Plan.
Research supported by the plan is helping to reduce shipping's impact on
the environment, improve our understanding of important ocean conditions
like red tides, teach us more about the oceans' role in climate change,
and improve our ability to protect Americans from natural disasters like
hurricanes and tsunamis.
We're expanding educational programs to teach citizens more about
the oceans. The truth of the matter is, there's a knowledge gap between
what scientists and biologists understand about oceans and what our
citizens understand about it. So we've ensured that teachers and
students and the public have access to the most up-to-date marine
science. Laura was particularly moved when she
went out to the Hawaiian National Monument to learn about the effects of
debris--you know, people just dropping stuff all over their boats, and
it gets in these currents and kills birds and clogs the ecosystem. She's
been very active about educating the young and old about the importance
of making sure we're wise about marine--not--stopping marine debris. The
Coastal Ecosystem Learning Center network is a interesting, innovative
idea where the public can learn hands on about sea life at more than 20
of America's top aquariums. So there will be kiosks in each aquarium
that are connected to here, as well as around the Nation, and people can
get information at their fingertips.
The great achievement, of course, is this new hall. It's built
through a partnership between NOAA and the Smithsonian. It's going to
introduce visitors to all kinds of interesting things: prehistoric
predators, what life is like around the coral reef, an animated display
of the oceans' impact on the global environment. It's worthwhile for our
citizens to come here. I think you're going to learn a lot. As part of
the exhibit's opening, a half-mile-long mural of ocean art by children
from 110 countries will show visitors to the National Mall the beauty of
sea life around the world. And of course, we thank those artists. My
favorite exhibit was the 24-foot giant squid. That's--the squid was
brought all the way from Spain as a joint operation between the Navy and
the Air Force--[laughter]--appropriately called Operation Calamari.
[Laughter] I do want to thank our military for bringing the deal here.
It is--[laughter]--it's worth looking at it. [Laughter]
Admiral, I don't know if you had anything
to do with it, but it's--if you did, it must have been a heck of an
operation. [Laughter]
And then people are going to come here and they're going to be
amazed to see a 45-foot replica of a female right whale. There are fewer
than 400 North Atlantic right whales left in the world. And the model in
this hall is inspired by a whale that got tangled in fishing gear but
got herself free. She was given the appropriate name of Phoenix. And
under the Ocean Action Plan, we've worked hard to protect whales like
her. Part of the 88 different actions we've taken was to work on smart
whale policy. And people in this room have helped. For example, we now
require fishermen to use more whale-friendly gear. Based on a careful
study of where right whales and ships are most likely to collide, we've
rerouted the shipping lanes near Boston Harbor. The action reduced the
danger to right whales like the Phoenix by nearly 60 percent.
And there are going to be new regulations that will be coming to be
shortly that require ships to slow down as they approach seaports where
these whales are likely to be.
In all these ways, the Ocean Action Plan is helping to protect our
planet's most essential natural resource. Yet we're going to do more.
And so I've asked--I've told people I'm sprinting to the finish; I mean,
4 months, you can actually get a lot done. And so I've asked the
Secretaries of the Interior,
Commerce, and Defense as well
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as the CEQ Chairman to work to find
additional areas in the Pacific that could be eligible for Federal
protection. We will improve our wetlands work by protecting, restoring,
and improving an additional 4 million acres.
It's important to set clear goals. We have set clear goals in this
administration, we have met those goals, and in this case, we're setting
a new goal. We will expand the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary to
include the Davidson Seamount. This 585-square-nautical-mile addition
will safeguard one of the largest known seamounts in U.S. waters, and it
will protect an extraordinary array of ocean creatures.
All Americans have a responsibility and obligation to be good
stewards of our environment. And one person who understands that is
Pietro Parravano. I met Pietro today. He is
a commercial fisherman in Half Moon Bay, California. He was as excited
to see this exhibit as I was. When a project to expand the nearby Port
of Oakland threatened the bay's fishing grounds, Pietro helped broker an
agreement that allowed the expansion of the port while protecting Half
Moon Bay. Pietro has continued his cooperative conservation work at the
local, State, and Federal and international levels. This fisherman has
been honored by NOAA and the EPA. He says, ``Conservation needs to be
everyone's priority, because the oceans belong to all Americans.''
I don't know where you are, Pietro,
but--somewhere around here--wherever you are--there he is. Thanks,
Pietro. Only in America. We're sure glad you're here, and thanks for
your work. Like, people--Pietro shows that, you know, you can make a
difference in your communities; it's just not all that hard. And part of
the purpose of this fantastic facility is to encourage people to do that
when it comes to the oceans.
I believe that the research that's going on and the actions that
will be taken by this administration and, hopefully, future
administrations will say to our children and grandchildren, we saw our
responsibility, and we met it; that those of us who work here in
Washington came here to be a constructive force, to see problems before
they became acute, and we did something about it. And for those of you
in this room who are doing something about it, I thank you from the
bottom of my heart, and so will future generations of Americans. God
bless.
Note: The President spoke at 10:15 a.m. in the Sant Ocean Hall at the
Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. In his remarks, he referred to
Pietro Parravano, secretary, San Mateo County Harbor District Board of
Commissioners.