Protecting Antarctica

Tourists who visit Antarctica must follow strict rules. They may not approach within 15 feet of wildlife. They are not allowed to sit, kneel, squat, or lie down. They may not even set their backpacks on the ground.

Authorities have imposed stringent biosecurity measures over concerns for things like avian flu, said Elizabeth Leane, professor of Antarctic studies at the University of Tasmania.

“It’s to the point of paranoia,” Leane said. “People are vacuuming out their pockets. They’re picking things out of their shoes, like tiny, tiny little things.”

Nearly 120,000 tourists visited Antarctica in 2024-2025, according to the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators (IAATO). Experts predict the number will rise due to tourism trends, raising questions about whether the benefits of Antarctic tourism outweigh the potential environmental harms.

In May, representatives from 44 countries met and discussed Antarctic cooperation under the 1959 Antarctic Treaty. That treaty dedicated Antarctica as a zone for peace and science. While 58 parties have joined the treaty, only half have decision-making power. The annual Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting considered a systematic way of managing tourism, among other topics.

“So the parties are now saying, OK, do we need some kind of system, instead of making decisions every year based on incidents that happen and having this kind of ad hoc approach where we just make little recommendations every year?” Leane said.

While IAATO’s guidelines only apply to its member tourism groups, the Antarctic Treaty applies to all operators based in a country who signed.

“The way the treaty system works essentially is that you do have to get environmental approval for your activity. But essentially, as long as that authority approves, it’s OK,” Leane said. “It’s kind of like a system where everything is OK unless someone says it’s not.”

The Antarctic Treaty parties are considering implementing more tourism rules, but Leane said it can take a long time for them to reach a consensus.

Antarctic tourism is a tiny fraction of the overall tourism industry. Countries in the Caribbean recorded the arrival of an estimated 35 million tourists last year. But most Antarctic tourists visit the Antarctic Peninsula, raising concerns about overtourism.

“A lot of Antarctica [is] kind of monumentally beautiful in a sense that it’s this great plateau of ice,” Leane said. “But at the peninsula you’ve got the sort of mountains poking up above the sea, a bit like the Alps in the sea, and there’s a lot of wildlife because it’s a slightly warmer, more maritime part of Antarctica.”

Only about two-thirds of Antarctic tourists set foot on the continent. The rest cruise around it in ships that carry 2,000-3,000 people. Only expedition ships carrying fewer than 500 people are allowed to land, and then only under certain conditions. Popular Antarctic activities include kayaking, camping, paddleboarding, helicopter rides, submersible vehicles, scuba diving, and marathons.

Within the Antarctic Peninsula, visitors flock to favored sites, usually places that are easy to land at and have penguin colonies. Experts debate whether to allow visitors to access broader areas and potentially spread lower-level harms more widely or to restrict visitors’ access, leaving some areas untouched while others are affected—a kind of “sacrifice,” Leane said.

When humans visit Antarctica, they often disrupt the environment by disturbing wildlife or flora, said Leane. Even ship hulls can carry invasive species, Leane added. IAATO’s guidelines note that visitors, including researchers, can unintentionally introduce seeds or microbes through clothing or gear.

Tourists can also transmit disease by traveling between bird colonies, so IAATO affiliates close sites if they find sick or dead animals. IAATO, the industry body that self-regulates Antarctic tourism, operates under the Antarctic Treaty. It cannot enforce regulations on non-member companies.

Leane said it’s important to minimize human interaction with Antarctica. But she doesn’t think banning tourism is the answer. That would encourage rogue tourists to operate outside the current regulations. Tourism allows people outside government and research organizations to visit one of Earth’s seven continents.

Can Seng Ooi is a professor of cultural and heritage tourism at the University of Tasmania and has nearly three decades of experience in tourism research. He said Antarctic tourism management depends more on trust than enforcement.

“It’s everyone’s responsibility. But I think if we want to be more effective and efficient, we actually have to start at the policy level,” Ooi said.

Ooi supports Antarctic tourism if it’s managed in a “sensitive manner,” but he thinks many people romanticize it.

“We have created this tourist culture where we want to go to the authentic and the unbeaten path, places that are getting more and more exotic and remote,” Ooi said. “Antarctica at the moment will fit that bill until millions of people have visited. Then I guess it’s no longer that exotic.”

Both Ooi and Leane agree Antarctic tourism can educate visitors about the environment. Ooi hopes that it will cause people to take better care of the environment even after they return home. But Leane said it’s hard to find evidence of that, especially since many people who come to Antarctica are already in love with it.

“It’s a bit of a debate as to what kind of tourism is acceptable in Antarctica,” Leane said. “Is … cruising by more acceptable because it’s less environmentally damaging, but sort of more passive? Or is it better to have this more active, involved, probably more educative version where people are interacting more with the continent and hence potentially doing more damage?”