ARE THERE STILL PRISTINE WATERS LEFT IN THE WORLD?

The short answer is yes; and they're located in the southern Pacific Ocean.

For six weeks – from March to May of this year – Dr. Enric Sala led a team of 12 scientists and five videographers to "study the last healthy, undisturbed places in the ocean." The marine expedition was through five of the southern Line Islands (or Equatorial Islands) in the Republic of Kiribati: Flint, Vostok, Starbuck, Malden and Caroline islands. These islands are located approximately 3,200 kilometres (2,000 miles) south of Hawai‘i.

His team studied and documented every aspect of the marine life surrounding these islands’ shores: water quality, fish populations, predator populations, as well as the health and diversity of the coral reef.

This National Geographic project called Ocean Now, is the latest in Dr. Sala's exploration of untouched marine ecosystems: he previously led other expeditions that studied the northern Line Islands in 2005 and 2007, which had a range of conditions from degraded to pristine waters.

It was during the latter expedition that Dr. Sala first discovered the condition of the Kingman Reef, which is believed to be one of the last intact marine environments undamaged by humankind.

The website PristineSeas.org developed by Dr. Sala, gives a good idea of how the Kingman Reef compares to other areas around the world such as the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands (Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument), Seychelles, Cuba, Kiritimati, etc.

The discovery of the Kingman Reef’s unspoiled condition is the reason why he returned two years later to further study the pristine ecosystem of the southern Line Islands.

These waters, as Dr. Sala explained, are “like the instruction manual for how the ocean works.” The Ocean Now expedition to the untouched southern Line Islands “is very different from previous research expeditions in the sense that we are studying an ecological machine that is complete and fully functional.”

The New York Times published an article that spoke to some of the reasons why the discovery of the Line Islands’ pristine marine ecosystem is so important for our understanding of how we may be able to better protect it and other areas in the future.

When asked why he was doing this expedition, Dr. Sala replied:

One of our biggest hopes is to inspire ocean lovers – and people who don’t know they are ocean lovers yet – to be stewards of our ocean. To bring more people and convince their policymakers to replicate this success story to increase the number of protected areas in the ocean. So that the ocean is at least as protected as the land.

In 2008, the Republic of Kiribati designated the area surrounding the Line Islands a protected marine reserve. Similar to the way in which the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument became protected in 2006.

Though the number of marine protected areas is few in comparison to their land-based equivalents, expeditions such as Ocean Now help to elevate the awareness level and increase the knowledge base so that our ocean ecosystems are hopefully able to recover from the decades of degradation.