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A New Home for African Penguins at De Hoop

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De Hoop

A New Home for African Penguins at De Hoop

A special collaboration between BirdLife South Africa, SANCCOB, and CapeNature is paving the way for a new beginning for African Penguins at De Hoop Nature Reserve. This exciting programme focuses on establishing a thriving new colony by releasing young African Penguins that were rescued as eggs or chicks and carefully rehabilitated by SANCCOB. The aim is to encourage these birds to settle and eventually breed in a safe, undisturbed environment, far from the pressures of human activity. So far this year, an incredible 88 penguins have been released at the site, offering hope for the future of this Critically Endangered species.

De Hoop

Source: SANCCOB

African Penguin newly classified as ‘critically endangered’ as breeding pairs fall below 10,000

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Penguin

Lonely Penguin by Andries Janse Van Rensburg

African Penguin newly classified as ‘critically endangered’ as breeding pairs fall below 10,000

  • The International Union for Conservation of Nature [IUCN] has uplisted the African Penguin from Endangered to Critically Endangered, underscoring the species’ extremely high risk of extinction in the wild.
  • The bird has already lost 97% of its population and could be extinct in less than 4,000 days if nothing changes.
  • Among other threats, commercial purse-seine fishing is competing with penguins for sardines and anchovies, their main source of food, leaving them hungry and making it harder to breed.
  • Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds [SANCCOB] and BirdLife South Africa have initiated landmark litigation against the South African government to enforce greater protection of this species.
  • The public can advocate for the African Penguin by signing an OnlyOne petition here, and watch a campaign video narrated by ocean conservationist, Zandi Ndhlovu here.

NEWS, CAPE TOWN, 28 OCTOBER: The African Penguin, with its distinctive black-and-white tuxedo and playful nature, is a cherished symbol in South Africa and around the world. Yet despite its popularity, the species has been uplisted to Critically Endangered by the IUCN, revealing it is one step away from becoming extinct in the wild. The bird is the first penguin species (of the 18 species globally) to meet the criteria for this classification.

SANCCOB and BirdLife South Africa, with the support of ocean conservation charity Blue Marine, are urging the South African government and the international community to take immediate action to save the African Penguin.

Faced with numerous threats, a primary cause of the African Penguin’s decline is a lack of available food due to climate change, made worse by competition from commercial fishing around its breeding colonies, which impacts the species’ survival and breeding success. While there are existing no-take zones where commercial fishing is prohibited to help the penguins better access the fish they feed on, primarily sardines and anchovies, research by seabird scientists has demonstrated that these zones are currently inadequate for penguin conservation.

The Red List rings the alarm louder for urgent action

The IUCN Red List is the international “Gold Standard” tool for measuring species extinction risk; to date, 163,040 species have been assessed, of which 45,321 are threatened with extinction.

SANCCOB, BirdLife South Africa, and Blue Marine have long been raising the alarm for better protection of the African Penguin. However, the reclassification to Critically Endangered marks a crucial juncture in the species’ future. While the Red List indicates the detrimental status of global biodiversity, it also points towards an urgent need for solutions, and the prioritisation of collaborative, cross-sector action before it’s too late.

The current commercial fishery no-take zones in South Africa surround six African Penguin colonies that represent 76% of the global African Penguin population. Yet research finds that these zones fail to sufficiently protect important feeding areas for the penguins, forcing them to compete with commercial fisheries for food.

Scientists such as BirdLife South Africa’s Dr Alistair McInnes and the University of Exeter’s Dr Richard Sherley recommend expanded and achievable no-take zones that provide more substantial benefits to penguins without causing disproportionately high costs to the purse-seine fishing industry.

International support is needed

SANCCOB and BirdLife South Africa have united to take legal action to enforce greater protection of the species. Launched by the Biodiversity Law Centre earlier this year, the two non-profit organisations have instituted a case against the office of the South African Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, to challenge the Minister’s “biologically meaningless” island closures to purse-seine fishing around key African Penguin colonies.

The legal action seeks to substitute the existing commercial fishery no-take zones with alternative zones designed using an internationally-recognised process that will better align them to the African Penguins’ important feeding areas, while minimising the impacts on the purse-seine fishing industry.

Meanwhile, the international community can help push governments to enact the changes needed to safeguard the species by signing the OnlyOne petition created by SANCCOB, BirdLife South Africa and Blue Marine.

The African Penguin also contributes to ecotourism and the local economy. A new socio-economic report found the total value of Boulders penguin colony and all other penguin colonies was estimated to be in the considerable range of R613 – 2702 million per year.

Natalie Maskell, CEO, SANCCOB said “The IUCN uplisting to Critically Endangered means that the African Penguins are just one step away from becoming extinct in the wild. SANCCOB will continue to fight for the future of this iconic species; we must remain optimistic that their trajectory can be reversed.”

Nicky Stander, Head of Conservation, SANCCOB said “Seeing a 97% loss in African Penguin populations is devastating and knowing they are now officially ‘Critically Endangered’ is a sobering thought. In just over a decade, they could no longer exist, which not only has an impact on our marine ecosystem, but also on South Africa’s economy and ecotourism. These animals are a key indicator of the wider ecological health of our ocean and are beloved worldwide. We cannot wait any longer for change.”

Dr Richard Sherley, Senior Lecturer, Ecology and Conservation, University of Exeter states “The African Penguin’s uplisting to Critically Endangered highlights a much bigger problem with the health of our environment. Despite being well-known and studied, these penguins are still facing extinction, showing just how severe the damage to our ecosystems has become. If a species as iconic as the African Penguin is struggling to survive, it raises the question of how many other species are disappearing without us even noticing. We need to act now—not just for penguins, but to protect the broader biodiversity that is crucial for the planet’s future.”

Alistair McInnes, Seabird Conservation Programme Manager, BirdLife South Africa points out that “The availability of sardine and anchovy is the key driver of the African Penguin population and the sustainable management of purse-seine fishing, such as the implementation of effective no-take zones around the last remaining large colonies, is a critical intervention to help conserve this species. If we don’t act timeously we could lose Africa’s only penguin species within our lifetime.”

Jo Coumbe, Communications Director, Blue Marine said “The plight of the African Penguin, now critically endangered, is heartbreaking. Losing the bird isn’t just about losing a species, it’s a stark warning of the tragic impacts on biodiversity and the health of our ocean.”

Source: SANCCOB

Ground-breaking litigation launched to protect the African Penguin from extinction

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Ground-breaking litigation launched to protect the African Penguin from extinction

The African Penguin has lost 97% of its population. If current trends persist, the species will be extinct in the wild by 2035. 

On 19 March 2024, the Biodiversity Law Centre, representing BirdLife South Africa and the Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds (SANCCOB), initiated landmark litigation in the Pretoria High Court in the interests of Africa’s only penguin species: the Endangered African Penguin (Spheniscus demersus).  

Instituted against the Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, the applicants’ challenge seeks the review and setting aside of the Minister’s 4 August 2023 decision on the closures to fishing around key African Penguin breeding colonies, instead of biologically meaningful closures.

The African Penguin faces extinction in the wild by 2035 if more is not done to curb the current rate of population decline. The crisis is driven primarily by their lack of access to prey, for which they must compete with the commercial purse-seine fishery which continues to catch sardine and anchovy in the waters surrounding the six largest African Penguin breeding colonies. Critically, these six colonies are home to an estimated 90% of South Africa’s African Penguins.

Ground-breaking

Kate Handley, Executive Director of the Biodiversity Law Centre, says: “This is the first litigation in South Africa invoking the Minister’s constitutional obligation to prevent extinction of an endangered species. It follows her failure – since at least 2018 – to implement biologically meaningful closures around African Penguin breeding areas, despite scientific evidence that such closures improve the species access to their critical sardine and anchovy food source, thereby contributing toward arresting the decline of the African Penguin.”

The Minister has statutory and constitutional obligations to ensure that necessary measures are put in place to prevent the African Penguin’s extinction. “The Minister has failed to fulfil these obligations to African Penguins, South Africans, the international community, and future generations. It is for this reason that we are taking her office to court,” Handley explains.

For more than six years, the Minister has placed her preference for a consensus-driven solution above her obligation to ensure the survival of the Endangered African Penguin. All the while, the African Penguin population has suffered an alarming decline of 8% per year on her watch.

Dr Alistair McInnes, Seabird Conservation Manager at BirdLife South Africa, says: “The African Penguin’s survival depends on the right decision being taken now. African Penguins at breeding colonies need access to food. Our challenge seeks to have the Minister take science-based decisions that are grounded on the internationally recognised and constitutionally enshrined precautionary principle. This is something that the Minister has consistently failed to do since 2018, notwithstanding having called multiple reviews.”

The impugned decision

The core of the applicants’ complaint against the Minister is her failure to implement biologically meaningful closures around African Penguin breeding areas. Instead, on 4 August 2023, she announced the continuation of inadequate “interim closures” around breeding colonies at Dassen Island, Robben Island, Stony Point, Dyer Island, St. Croix Island and Bird Island. These closures were first imposed in September 2022 while an international panel of experts extensively reviewed the science collected since 2008 as part of an Island Closure Experiment (ICE).

The panel recommended that closures of sardine and anchovy fishing grounds to commercial small pelagic fisheries around six main breeding colonies was an appropriate and necessary conservation intervention with demonstrable benefits to African Penguin populations. It also provided a method for determining the appropriate island delineations which would seek to optimise benefits of closures to African Penguins, while minimising costs to the small-pelagic purse-seine industry. In doing so, it put an end to scientific debates on how to determine closure delineations and also confirmed the appropriate method for determining African Penguins’ preferred foraging range.

The Panel’s recommendations were provided to the Minister in July 2023 with the express purpose of enabling the Minister to take definitive, science-based decisions regarding island closures after years of indecision and debate. During this time, in 2023, the species fell below the 10,000 breeding pairs mark for the first time in history. On 4 August 2023, the Minister announced her decision.

Dr Katta Ludynia, Research Manager at SANCCOB, says:

“The Minister was selective about which recommendations she followed. Inexplicably, she failed to follow the critical recommendation regarding how closures should be delineated. Instead, the Minister decided to extend the meaningless interim closures, unless agreement between the conservation sector and the fishing industry could be reached on an alternative.

The African Penguin population in South Africa has plummeted from 27,151 breeding pairs in 2008, when the ICE commenced, to 15,187 breeding pairs when the results of the experiment were first published and peer-reviewed in 2018, and now to only an estimated 8,750 breeding pairs. The Minister has unfortunately failed to act. Biologically meaningless closures are now in place until December 2033 – just more than a year from the possible extinction date of 2035.”

An irrational and unlawful decision

The applicants argue that this approach was patently irrational. First, it is unclear why certain recommendations should be followed but not others.  Second, and critically, the interim closures themselves are incapable of meeting the purpose of closures, namely to reduce competition between African Penguins and the purse-seine commercial fishing industry for sardines and anchovies. “Moreover, the notion that an alternative set of closures could be delineated by agreement between conservationists and industry defeats the purpose of the panel, which was initiated to end many rounds of disagreement between these stakeholder groups and the various conservation and fisheries focused branches of the DFFE,” says McInnes.

According to Handley, the Minister has also acted unlawfully. She says: “The Constitution and legislative scheme give rise to a duty to implement urgent measures to prevent the impending extinction of the African Penguin. These include the imposition of fishing closures which limit purse-seine anchovy and sardine fishing activities. Despite this clear obligation, the Minister has consistently failed to implement such closures.”

The applicants are asking the court to ensure that a set of meaningful closures identified using the recommendations of the panel are imposed around all six islands.  The Minister has had ample opportunity to do so, and a court faced with the evidence the applicants are placing before it will be in as good a position as the Minister to ensure the necessary conservation actions are urgently implemented. 

What are we doing about this crisis?

Handley says: “The review application is a watershed, and potentially precedent-setting case, as it stands to give content to the South African government’s obligation to protect Endangered species and, particularly in this instance, the African Penguin. It also takes a stance on the role of science-led decision-making in ensuring that future generations have their environment, and the well-being of an endangered species, protected.”

About the applicants

  • BirdLife South Africa is a non-profit organisation whose vision is a country and region where nature and people live in greater harmony, more equitably and more sustainably, while its mission is to conserve birds, their habitats and biodiversity through, inter alia, scientifically-based programmes and supporting the sustainable and equitable use of natural resources. BirdLife South Africa actively works towards the conservation of African Penguins through its Seabird Conservation Programme.
  • SANCCOB is registered as a non-profit company, non-profit organisation and public benefit organisation in terms of the laws of South Africa, operating from two facilities in the Western Cape and Eastern Cape. SANCCOB’s primary objective is to reverse the decline of seabird populations – flagship species being the endangered African penguin – through a multi-faceted conservation approach that includes rehabilitation and release of seabirds, implementation and consultancy of preparedness and response in the event of oil spills affecting marine wildlife, carrying out integral scientific research, provision of in-situ support to conservation managing authorities, skills development, and public awareness via environmental education.

About the Biodiversity Law Centre

  • The Biodiversity Law Centre is a non-profit organisation that seeks to use the law to protect and restore indigenous species and ecosystems in Southern Africa. As part of its Oceans and Coasts Programme, the Centre is committed to protecting African Penguin populations by addressing the key drivers of the species’ decline, including competition with small pelagic fisheries, and ship-to-ship bunkering in Algoa Bay.

Source: SANCCOB