Heard Island and McDonald Islands - Administration and Economy

Administration and Economy

The United Kingdom formally established its claim to Heard Island in 1910, marked by the raising of the Union Jack and the erection of a beacon by Captain Evensen, master of the Mangoro. Effective government, administration and control of Heard Island and the McDonald Islands was transferred to the Australian government on 26 December 1947 at the commencement of the first Australian National Antarctic Research Expedition (ANARE) to Heard Island, with a formal declaration that took place at Atlas Cove. The transfer was confirmed by an exchange of letters between the two governments on 19 December 1950.

The islands are a territory (Territory of Heard Island and McDonald Islands) of Australia administered from Hobart by the Australian Antarctic Division of the Australian Department of the Environment and Water Resources. They are populated by large numbers of seal and bird species. The islands are contained within a 65,000-square-kilometre (25,000 sq mi) marine reserve and are primarily visited for research. There is no permanent human habitation.

From 1947 until 1955 there were camps of visiting scientists on Heard Island (at Atlas Cove in the northwest, which was in 1969 again occupied by American scientists and expanded in 1971 by French scientists) and in 1971 on McDonald Island (at Williams Bay). Later expeditions used a temporary base at Spit Bay in the east, such as in 1988, 1992–93 and 2004–05.

With no population, there is no indigenous economic activity. The islands' only natural resource is fish; the Australian government allows limited fishing in the surrounding waters. Despite the lack of population, the islands have been assigned the country code HM in ISO 3166-1 (ISO 3166-2:HM) and therefore the Internet top-level domain .hm. The timezone of the islands is UTC+5.