Committee: Partition of AntarcticaCountry: NorwaySince first being sighted during a Russian voyage in 1820, Antarctica has remained completely free of civilian settlements for over a century due to its bleak and unforgiving climate.At the time of its discovery, 98% of the continent was covered by thick continental ice sheets. Not much has changed since, and with temperatures recorded as low as -130 degrees Fahrenheit, winds of up to 200 miles per hour, and average precipitation of only 6.5 inches per year, Antarctica remains the harshest continent on the planet in 2050. The main points of the Antarctic Treaty are as follows: the treaty neither recognizes, establishes, nor rejects any cla ...view middle of the document...
Its lack of EU membership however has not significantly impaired the government's activities, and the nation's extensive social safety net continues to ensure one of the highest quality of life standards in the world for every Norwegian citizen, to great popular support. Norwegian fishermen and whalers have recently increased pressure on the government to allow fishing and whaling activities in the rich waters surrounding the Antarctic. The involvement of Norwegian fishermen in fish stock management is a very indirect one. Together with government officials, they are represented in an advisory committee making proposals about catch quotas and their allocation, and other management measures. To judge from the record, the fishermen's role in this process has not been overly constructive; most often their representatives have pressed for larger catch quotas than proposed by the officials and their experts. Sometimes the fishermen have had a point; the officials' proposals are usually devoid of any economic content and based on purely biological criteria. The impact is that fisherman have a huge role in the policies of the Norwegian government and because fishing is an important industry, Norway is trying to receive offshore parts of Antarctica. Furthermore, the additional economic activity by these such practices would add to Norway's primary exports of petroleum and natural gas. Most of the speculation about petroleum comes from finding petroleum on the other Southern continents which were at one time connected together. The petroleum deposits thought to be on the offshore regions of Antarctica would probably be most feasible to obtain.For this reason, Norway would like to request offsh...