This is not the march of the African penguins we want to see

African penguins, unique to South Africa and Namibia, are experiencing dramatic population declines…we must act fast before we see them disappear altogether.

We were stunned into complete silence. After 90 minutes on a bumpy boat, we had reached St Croix island off of the coast of Gqeberha. Until recently the island was home to the biggest colony of African penguins in the world, and we were looking forward to seeing these cute and comical little birds.  Yet, as we approached St Croix there were no penguins to be seen – not a single one.

Prof Lorian Pichegru, who spent the last decade of her life monitoring the St Croix colony – often staying on the island for weeks on her own - explained that they had seen a rapid and dramatic collapse of the colony over the last few years.

“Where did they go?” I asked Prof Pichegru. “That is the problem,” she answered sadly.

“Once penguins established breeding grounds, they don’t move. They die.”

St Croix is not unique.

Since the early 2000s, the numbers of African penguins, unique to Namibia and South Africa, have dropped rapidly due to a decrease in the sardine and anchovy populations on which they feed. This is largely due to commercial fishing around these colonies.

In 2018, in an attempt to establish how to improve conditions for African penguins, the national department conducted an unique experiment. They closed the waters around some African penguin colonies to pelagic fishing for three years, while a neighbouring colony remained open as a comparison.

This experiment was carefully studied by several scientists from UCT and NMU, who showed the benefits of fishing exclusions for penguins. The results were published in various peer-reviewed scientific journals. Unsurprisingly, “scientists” employed by the fishing industry denied these outcomes.  Despite no verifiable evidence they and the fishing industry claimed economic loss and complained bitterly to government. These prolonged debates prevented any relevant decision from being made and despite the Environment Minister’s promise for a decision two years ago, there is currently no fishing exclusions in place.

In the meantime the penguin numbers continue to drop rapidly.

In 2013, a Biodiversity Management Plan (BMP) to try and deal with the declining numbers was also published by the department. The BMP provided guidelines for certain methods, such as removing predators of penguin chicks and eggs, setting artificial nests to provide shelter against heat and storms, and chick bolstering by rehabilitation to boost the wild population. While these methods were successful in improving the habitat on land for penguins, their foraging habitat at sea kept deteriorating, and as a consequence, African penguin numbers are now at their lowest record ever. 

A second BMP is now open to public comments. This is a very important document to improve African penguin conservation status, however there is still no clear decision on fishing exclusions, despite the extreme urgency of the situation.

It also ignores the emerging threats of noise pollution, which scientists have proven strongly affect African penguins. For example, African penguins are known to actively avoid seismic survey activities (exploring for oil and gas under the seabed by the use of extremely loud sounds) within 100 km of their habitat.

In 2016, offshore Ship-to-Ship bunkering operations (the refuelling of one ship by another at sea in order to avoid paying harbour fees) started in Algoa Bay. This bizarre decision under the Zuma regime attracted a large increase in maritime traffic to the bay. I say bizarre because it is difficult to understand the benefit to South Africa. Not only do we lose out on revenue from the significant docking fees in the harbour, but the oil used for refuelling is primarily kept in international waters by foreign oil companies and then brought into the bay by smaller refuelling vessels, which leave once the fuel is transferred. So, it seems there are little economic benefits yet massive environmental risk for Algoa Bay and the country.

During our visit to St. Croix, we watched these refuelling operations at close proximity. Oil was transferred without any buffers to minimise oil spills, so it comes as no surprise that there have been four oil spills since these operations started.

Scientists have also proved that bunkering resulted in a doubling of underwater noise levels in the bay. This, they say, has played a significant and direct role in the 85% decline in the penguin colony on St Croix Island. Sadly, the recently published BMP also does not provide for maritime noise exclusion zones.

The problem is that we are running out of time.

Penguin numbers are dropping rapidly. The penguins can’t afford to wait for the lengthy process around the BMP to be completed. If we want to rescue these unique animals (who are also major tourist attractions), the Minister needs to step in fast and take dramatic action.

I certainly hope she will, since it will be tragedy if future generations have to rely on Netflix or Youtube footage of these beautiful animals that no longer exist.