Big boost for Antipodean Albatross – thanks to US$140,000 Global Birdfair funding

Header image: Antipodean Albatross © Stephanie Borrelle

The plight of the Antipodean Albatross 

When thinking about species that are inadvertently caught by fisheries, a three-metre-wide bird might not be the first species to come to mind. It’s probably easier to conjure visions of sea turtles or dolphins caught in nets (also known as bycatch), and yet even so-called giants of the sea, such as albatrosses, are impacted by that issue.  

One of these unfortunate birds is the Antipodean Albatross, which lives on the tiny Antipodes and Auckland islands, the southernmost islands of Aotearoa, New Zealand. The area this species occupies on land may be small, but these magnificent creatures reign over an area of the Southern Ocean 70,000 times that size!  

Antipodean Albatrosses spend more than a decade wandering the oceans, returning to their tiny Antipodes Island when they’re about 16 years old to find a mate and breed. Mating for life and producing one chick every two years, it takes a whole year for both parents to raise their chick. The parents of this chick will travel tens to hundreds of kilometres over days and weeks to find food for their ever-growing chick.  

While hunting squid, this parent won’t know if that delicious, nutritious squid has a deadly hook embedded. If it does, then they’ll drown – dragged underwater by the longline hooks used to harvest tuna and swordfish. Doing what every parent would do, they would die feeding their family. Vessels in longline fleets operate fishing lines up to 100 kms long, deploying as many as 40,000 baited hooks, each set to catch fish like tuna and swordfish – each sharp barb potentially causing an albatross death. 

25 years of science and conservation action 

The bycatch of albatrosses is an issue that we, at BirdLife International, have been working on for over 25 years when the scientific community realised that there was a gap between scientific knowledge and practical application on board fishing vessels. The British Birdwatching Fair – an annual event in the UK, now known as Global Birdfair – got involved in 2000 and raised critical funds for the Save The Albatross Campaign.  

This generous donation allowed us to bridge this gap, alongside our Partner in the UK, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB), by teaming up with a group of marine conservation experts from southern Africa and South America to launch the Albatross Task Force (ATF). The ATF is the world’s first international team of bycatch mitigation instructors, and its mission is to reduce bycatch of albatrosses and large petrels by working directly with the fishing industry and governments to develop, demonstrate and implement mitigation measures at-sea. 

Thanks to ATF’s research, grassroots engagement, and advocacy work, bycatch mitigation measures are now compulsory in nine out of the original 10 target fisheries! BirdLife’s experience in other oceans has demonstrated extraordinary success. For example, we saw a 99% reduction in bycatch of albatrosses in the South African trawl fleet. This means saving thousands of seabirds that were previously killed in these fisheries every year. 

This is where we go back to the Antipodean Albatross. The decades of data and conservation action that sprouted from the 2000 campaign are now being used to save the Antipodean Albatross in the Pacific.  

Off the hook: working with fishers and local communities  

Fast forward to today, and we are thrilled to have received a US$140,000 donation from Global Birdfair. This funding supports our Safeguarding Ocean Species project, aiming to reduce the bycatch of Antipodean Albatrosses working from our base in Suva, Fiji.   

Margaret West, Regional Director of BirdLife Pacific said: 

“BirdLife Pacific is incredibly grateful to be the recipient of the 2025 Global Birdfair to support our port-based action to stop albatross bycatch in longline fisheries on the high seas. We are thrilled that the money raised will allow us to reach more vessels that interact with these magnificent birds to support them in implementing mitigation measures, saving our seabirds for nature and future generations to enjoy.” 

Visiting over 500 fishing vessels since 2017, the team has significantly raised awareness of the importance of seabird safe fishing and saw an increase in the use of bird-scaring lines, also known as Tori lines.  

These seabird-safe fishing lines are produced locally by a group of women from a church in Makoi, Nasinu, a suburb outside of Suva. Having learned the design and logic behind making the Tori lines, the women are able to help support their families with this new craft. Many spoke of the challenges they faced in just putting food on their families’ tables and their gratitude for this opportunity. 

The generous donation from Global Birdfair will enable an expansion of the programme to other Pacific Island ports, and empower more women to build Tori lines, ultimately increasing the availability of these lines to tuna longline vessels, with a much greater impact in reducing unnecessary albatross deaths. 

Tim Appleton and Penny Robinson, founders and organisers of Global Birdfair, would like to thank all those who helped raise this amazing sum, including their sponsors, the more than 14,000 people who attended the fair in July and the incredible volunteers who give their time so freely. Tim Appleton and Penny Robinson, founders and organisers of Global Birdfair said: 

“Selecting a project each year to support is a challenging task, but Safeguarding Ocean Species stood out immediately as the one for Global Birdfair 2025. Land based conservation is there for all to see but out in the deep blue seas, it is almost impossible to evaluate the massive challenges and threats faced by so many seabird species.  Returning to support marine birds seemed wholly appropriate given the increased exposure to the state of the World’s Oceans in 2025.”