A warmer Arctic needs new rules to regulate commercial development because climate change has dangerously affected the area, according to a World Wildlife Fund report released Monday.

A Walrus sitting on melting ice, basks in the sun on the Chukchi Sea, between Alaska and Russia.[File photo]

The melting of the Arctic ice is opening a new ocean, which brings new possibilities for fishing, oil exploration, development and shipping activities, and the current regulatory and governance regime for protection of the Arctic marine environment has become inadequate, the report said.

The International Governance and Regulation of the Marine Arctic report encourages governments to overhaul the governance regime for the Arctic.

"What happens in the Arctic has a global environmental and economic impact," said Lasse Gustavsson, incoming executive conservation director for WWF International and currently CEO of WWF Sweden. "For instance, more than a quarter of the fish eaten in Europe comes from the Arctic, and yet we do not have effective rules for fishing in newly accessible areas."

WWF believes the Arctic may be ice free in the summers within decades.

At the same time, commercial ships have recently successfully sailed the Northern Sea Route above Siberia, and shipyards are getting increasing numbers of orders for tankers capable of dealing with remnant ice, the report said.

"We challenge Arctic governments to advance alternatives that would work equally well to safeguard the region," Gustavsson said. "The ice has protected the Arctic Ocean for hundreds of years; we have collectively removed that protection though our contributions to climate change, and now we must work collectively to replace that protection."

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