Cruise ships and intensified tourism in Mexico threaten whale shark habitat

In December 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, more than a dozen mega cruise ships were stationed in Bahía de La Paz, Baja California Sur, Mexico, due to the tourism shutdown. This led to pollution of the ecosystem and the displacement of marine species such as the whale shark (Rhincodon typus), which was not seen again in the area until 2022. A new port agreement with a tourism company could see this situation repeat.

Environmental organizations are urging the government of the northwestern Mexican state to cancel this agreement, originally made in 2021 between the government-owned Integral Port Administration of Baja California Sur (API BCS in Spanish) and the private company Aquamayan Adventure. The agreement gives the company control over part of the port of Pichilingue in La Paz and allows mega cruise ships to enter Bahía de La Paz, or the bay of La Paz, the capital city of Baja California Sur.

Cruise ships anchored in Bahía de La Paz, where concerns have been raised about marine and air pollution caused by the presence of a thermal power station, automobile traffic and the engines of the ships. Image courtesy of BCSicletos.

The agreement, which was shelved at the time due to non-compliance with environmental regulations, was resuscitated and modified late last year, and now authorizes the private company to use 33,500 square meters (360,600 square feet) of the port, where it plans to build a tourism and commercial complex featuring restaurants, shops, recreational areas and even a desalinization plant. The goal is to attract at least 150,000 mega cruise passengers per year. This figure quadruples the number received in 2023 and is equivalent to 60% of the resident population of the city of La Paz.

“We are suddenly confronted with this agreement between the state and the company, and we find that the government is promoting the project, subjecting La Paz to this very predatory model of extractive tourism, based on mega cruise ships,” says Carlos Mancilla, director of BCSicletos, the environmental organization responsible for the campaign “¡Viva Bahía de La Paz!” and an online petition addressed to Governor Víctor Castro Cosío.

The demand is to prohibit this and any other project involving the admission of mega cruise ships to the area. According to BCSicletos, these projects pose a huge threat to local ecosystems and society, as the large tourist vessels generate huge quantities of waste and pollution, while also demanding energy, water and space in a highly sensitive and vulnerable area.

6.Crisis ilustrada scaled — “Crisis Illustrated” was a campaign in which local artists spoke out against the mega cruise ships. They stuck stickers and put up posters in the busiest parts of La Paz, primarily along the waterfront and at supporting businesses. Image courtesy of BCSicletos.

“This issue provoked a huge social movement in 2021 and the community made it clear that Bahía de La Paz is not a parking lot for mega cruise ships,” Mancilla says. “Now, unfortunately, the authorities, together with the private sector, not only want it to be a parking lot, but also allow all of the dynamics associated with this to happen.”

The negative impacts are extensive and well documented, says Mancilla. They range from endangering marine species and sensitive ecosystems to generating large quantities of trash and requiring infrastructure that the bay cannot support and the city does not have. The projects will negatively affect those who depend on fishing and ecotourism, while leading to gentrification and urban inequalities, increasing the cost of living and access to basic services for local residents, Mancilla says.

2.Mural tiburon ballena scaled — A meeting of artists led to the creation of a collaborative mural in downtown La Paz, featuring the iconic whale shark and a cruise ship broken in half. Image courtesy of BCSicletos.

Bahía de La Paz is a place of impressive marine biodiversity. It has ecosystems ranging from coral reefs to cold water habitats, all of which are highly productive. The region is crucial for the migration, wintering and breeding of at least 160 species of aquatic birds. It also hosts 32% of the world’s cetaceans — dolphins, whales and porpoises — and is an important refuge for the whale shark, which prefers its warm waters, as they provide a safe environment and food between autumn and spring.

Measuring on average 12 meters (40 feet) in length, the whale shark is considered the biggest fish in the world and is included in Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the threatened category under the Official Mexican Standards.

A 2021 report about the cruise ships anchored in Bahía de La Paz, published by the Northwest Biological Research Center (CIBNOR), estimates a population of between 125 and 129 whale shark specimens per season in the area and suggests a total population of 1,700 individuals in the entire Gulf of California.

MG 9846 — A whale shark swimming through a shoal of sardines. Image courtesy of Frida Lara.

According to the authors, it used to be common to see whale sharks within ten minutes of the port of Bahía de La Paz, which led to decades of research and the eventual creation of the Whale Shark Refuge, established on Nov. 29, 2018, to protect their habitat.

However, following the arrival of mega cruise ships in December 2020, sightings reduced drastically. By April 2021, whale sharks were no longer in their usual locations, meaning one had to travel more than an hour to find them. Experts point to a combination of possible reasons for this: The noise of engines and turbines working 24 hours a day in the enormous vessels and light and water pollution, which may have affected the plankton on which the species feeds.

“The area’s resilience was impacted because of the dunes that protect it, which prevent any currents from removing pollutants,” Mancilla says. “A mega cruise ship requires on average 11,000 liters [2,906 gallons] of fuel a day — they use fuel oil or liquefied natural gas that comes from environmentally-damaging fracking processes — so they emit as much toxic gas as 10,000 to 30,000 cars.”

All this has reduced the duration of whale shark season, which used to end in May, and, in addition to the ecological impacts, has also led to significant economic losses for local families who depend on whale shark activity.

MG 9873 — A swimmer next to a whale shark in Bahía de La Paz. Image courtesy of Frida Lara.

“The whale shark comes here, it’s one of their most iconic places in the world and one of the most special concentrations of individuals, being very close to a city,” says Frida Lara, a specialist in marine species and scientific coordinator at Orcgas. “For example, in the case of the Galápagos — which has another very famous aggregation — you have to travel by boat and pay $10,000 to be able to see a whale shark,” she says.

The expert adds that the likelihood of collisions is one of the most important threats to species like this. A study published in July 2024 confirmed this: Together with the Arabian Sea and its adjacent waters, as well as Southeast and East Asia, both the Gulf of Mexico and the Gulf of California pose the greatest risk of collision between whale sharks and large vessels.

“Changing Bahía de La Paz will have negative effects on the whale shark, the giant manta ray and whales,” Lara says. “If it has already been proven, with a significant amount of scientific evidence, that this place is a critical habitat for these species, why has a project of this kind been deemed viable here?”

Research efforts continue. This year, a team of scientists led by biologist Fabián Missael Rodríguez plans to monitor the impacts of tourism on whale sharks in the region by using drones. They have launched a fundraising campaign to finance the project, which seeks to fill information gaps and improve conservation efforts based on scientific evidence.

Foto Jorge Urban R PRIMMA UABCS — The presence of mega cruise ships in Bahía de La Paz could have serious impacts for marine biodiversity. Image courtesy of Jorge Urbán R. / PRIMMA-UABCS.

A wall now surrounds the port of Pichilingue. Jorge del Ángel, biologist and president of the Baja California Sur Academic Collective, says that construction work used to be visible before, but now it is all hidden.

“Normally, when you went to the beaches, you could see any changes that had been made to the port of Pichilingue. This isn’t the case anymore. This makes it even more difficult to convince people that there’s an issue,” del Ángel says.

Now, he says, the city of La Paz and its bay are being “bombarded” by projects that go hand in hand, especially with the real estate industry. While civil society is increasingly organized, there are so many problems that it is impossible to deal with all of them at once.

9.1 Megacruceros e inmobiliarias — One of the drawings by local people representing the problems of mass tourism, displacement, gentrification and other processes which increase with the arrival of mega cruise ships and real estate agencies. Image courtesy of BCSicletos.

“Cruise ships are one of the problems, but it’s not even the most worrying one for [the local] people, because we’ve been bombarded with projects and are constantly defending ourselves against this or that. What’s more, many of these projects are made even worse due to the complicity of the local authorities,” del Ángel says.

Mongabay Latam contacted API BCS to hear their side of the story, but received no response. The company Aquamayan Adventure, for their part, do not have any public channels of communication.

“What we want are two things: the first is transparency,” del Ángel says. “That is to say, we need everyone — both leaders and citizens — to understand the verification process for compliance with the international regulations that these vessels are supposedly subject to.”

Captura de Pantalla 2025 02 16 a las 20.25.48 — The campaign “¡Viva la Bahía!” organized a peaceful protest against mega cruise ships and real estate agencies. Image courtesy of BCSicletos.

The second, del Ángel says, is to establish baselines through research. For this, the Baja California Sur Academic Collective is using citizen science to develop a project focused on detecting hydrocarbons. “In other words, local tourism operators, fishers, organizations and people who have contact with the sea, participate,” he says. “The idea is to get regular water samples so that we can monitor the levels of pollutants. We need this basic information so that we can say how serious the problem is.”

According to del Ángel, the present case of mass tourism in Bahía de La Paz is just one of many to come for the Gulf of California. “We’re basically guinea pigs; they’re testing it with us to see how it goes,” he says. “Of course, we have to stand up to them because, otherwise, we risk the same model being implemented in the other gulf ports, which are also very vulnerable areas.”

8 Mural COBACH scaled — A group of students decided to create a mural at their school in response to the mega cruise ship conflict. Image courtesy of BCSicletos.

A whale shark in unusual visibility in Bahía de La Paz. Normally, the intense activity in the area makes the water murky. Image courtesy of Frida Lara.