Managing the frozen commons - Antarctica: Global Science from a Frozen Continent - page 289

Figure 10.7 New Zealand Ambassador

Chris Beeby, who chaired the Antarctic
Treaty Special Consultative Meetings on
Antarctic minerals from 1982-88 and was
a principal architect of the Convention on
the Regulation of Antarctic Mineral
Resource Activities. He died 19 March
2000. (Credit: Ministry of Foreign Affairs
and Trade, New Zealand)

withdraw after a further 2 years. So tensions rose among the parties. Fortunately, all
agreed that consensus had to be reached again, and no later than 1991.
The way forward involved negotiating a comprehensive regime to protect
the Antarctic environment, including a mining ban. Given the short time available
it was fortunate that much of the environmental regulations developed during
the CRAMRA negotiations could be used.
The Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty was signed
in Madrid on 4 October 1991 and entered into force in 1998 when it was rati ed by

the last of the ATCPs. It designated Antarctica as a ' natural reserve devoted to peace

and science , and it set forth basic principles applicable to all human activities in

Antarctica, including dispute settlement procedures. All activities relating to
Antarctic mineral resources, except for scienti

'

c research, were prohibited for
50 years, i.e. until 2048. In this period the Protocol can only be modi ed by

unanimous agreement of all Consultative Parties, and in addition, the prohibition on
mineral resource activities cannot be removed unless a binding legal regime on
Antarctic mineral resource activities is in force.
The Protocol has six Annexes: Environmental Impact Assessment (Annex I),
Conservation of Antarctic Fauna and Flora (II), Waste Disposal and Waste