site.btaAntarctica Shows How Crucial Climate Change Is, Says Assoc. Prof. Marina Stefanova

Antarctica demonstrates in the clearest way how critical climate change has become, and although not everyone can travel there to see this first-hand, society can be engaged in environmental protection through education and public commitment, Associate Professor Marina Stefanova told BTA.

Assoc. Prof. Stefanova is a lawyer and economist and currently serves as Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Economics at Sofia University. Her Antarctic research is structured in three stages, the final one being carried out on site at Bulgaria’s Antarctic base St. Kliment Ohridski.

She explained that while most people do not have the opportunity to visit Antarctica to understand the scale of climate change, society, especially through education, can create products, relationships, and attitudes, both among teachers and in educational materials, that frame environmental protection as a real responsibility of every citizen, even in places that are not part of national territory.

In practice, she said, this could be achieved by integrating environmental policies into education, developing green professions, and aligning economic activities with their environmental footprint. Through legal analysis at both international and national levels, she is examining Bulgaria’s role in the governance model and major institutions related to Antarctica, as well as how Antarctic activities are financed and what opportunities exist for attracting additional and alternative sources of funding that have so far remained inaccessible.

She pointed out that such opportunities include climate finance linked to the three major international agreements. The central one concerns climate change, namely the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. Another key area is biodiversity protection. Since the beginning of 2026, a third crucial agreement has also entered into force, concerning ocean conservation and affecting Antarctica and most likely Bulgaria as well.

Assoc. Prof. Stefanova also works in South America, collaborating with the Magellan Institute and INACH, where she cooperates with colleagues from the social sciences. She is also preparing joint work with Juan de Bosco University in Argentina. The first stage of her project focuses on tracking cooperation and communication among national Antarctic institutes on issues related to how Antarctic operations function.

Another component of her research, linked to economic analysis, explores current financial models, including how funds are raised, whether financing is private, public, or mixed, and whether additional economic activities are created. She emphasized that climate finance is particularly important because Antarctica is witnessing the fastest climate change impacts on flora and fauna. Since the continent functions as a “thermometer” for the rest of the world, this information can be used to develop future scenarios for other regions where changes unfold more slowly but with significant effects.

She stressed that the work is less about developing human capital and more about intellectual capital, the output of international research. While scientists can measure part of their impact through publications and conference participation, society and the state, including Bulgaria, can identify many more indicators here that illustrate how science influences society and the economy.

The final product of the study will be a monograph compiling the collected data, designed to be “smartly replicated” for other global objectives such as ocean and atmospheric protection. She said that if a model governing a territory that belongs to no single state but is managed as a shared space could be transferred elsewhere, it could foster a sense of responsible stewardship over other areas affected by pollution, acidification, and mismanagement. These impacts cannot be attributed to one country but affect everyone in the medium term.

The Antarctic phase of her research is linked to the legal concept of the “good steward”. From this perspective, she said, another layer of relationships and identity is added, one closely tied to environmental protection and requiring active behaviour – not only what people are, but what they do to safeguard nature. Her work examines the characteristics of Bulgarian Antarctic expedition members, compares them with participants from other national expeditions, and then contrasts both groups with people who have never taken part in such missions.

According to her, this comparison will show whether there are differences in attitudes, knowledge, and environmentally related behaviour, not only in Antarctica but throughout their lives. At the Bulgarian Antarctic base, she organized a social game aimed at promoting the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

She explained that the game focused on building a shared vision of the future based on participants’ wishes, interests, and personal goals. She said she was pleased that the initiative proved successful, as in the second stage participants worked more consciously, cooperated more actively, and reached a balanced vision of the world by 2050, which was the game’s endpoint. She added that a questionnaire related to environmental protection would also be distributed among Antarctic expedition members.

The Bulgarian naval research vessel Sv. Sv. Kiril i Metodii (RSV 421) departed for Antarctica from Varna (on the Black Sea) on November 7, 2025. After a month-long voyage across the Atlantic Ocean, the ship arrived at the Argentine naval base in Mar del Plata on December 13.

BTA has had a national press club on board the ship since 2022 and another on Livingston Island since February 2024. BTA Director General Kiril Valchev said they exist thanks to the generous support of RSV 421 and Bulgaria’s St Kliment Ohridski Base, which provide the necessary facilities. These two press clubs are added to the news agency’s other 41 national press clubs (33 in Bulgaria, seven abroad in neighbouring countries and in nations with large Bulgarian communities, and one mobile National Book Press Club).

The news items of BTA's special correspondents on RSV 421 and Antarctica are freely available in Bulgarian and English on the agency's website. They can be used free of charge by all media, with attribution to BTA.