Let’s end the ocean emergency

Humanity has been waging a senseless and self-defeating war on nature. And the ocean is on the front lines of the battle.

In the face of climate change and plastic pollution, humanity has its own race to win: the race to protect our ocean for the future.

The ocean supports the air we breathe, the food we consume, the cultures and identities that define us, the jobs and prosperity that sustain us, the regulation of weather and climate.

And billions of animals, plants, and microorganisms that call the ocean home. The ocean is life. The ocean is livelihoods. And the ocean is in trouble. Humanity has been waging a senseless and self-defeating war on nature. And the ocean is on the front lines of the battle.

Around 35 per cent of global fish stocks in the world are over-exploited.

Global heating is pushing ocean temperatures to new heights, fueling more frequent and intense storms, rising sea levels, and the salinization of coastal lands and aquifers. Once-rich coral habitats are being bleached to oblivion. Mangrove forests are being destroyed, taking the species they host with them.

And meanwhile, toxic chemicals and millions of tons of plastic waste are flooding into coastal ecosystems — killing or injuring fish, sea turtles, seabirds and marine mammals, and making their way into the food chain and ultimately being consumed by us.

By 2050, there could be more plastic in the sea than fish.

The good news is that last year, the world took some important steps to correct our course.

This includes the historic agreement in Nairobi to negotiate a globally binding treaty to control plastic pollution.

It includes the World Trade Organization’s agreement to end harmful fisheries subsidies that so often result in illegal fishing.

At the UN Ocean Conference in Lisbon, countries have made hundreds of new voluntary commitments and pledges to protect the ocean — a positive trend we hope will continue at this year’s conference in Panama.

And at the UN Biodiversity Conference in Montreal, countries agreed on a target to protect 30 percent of land, water, coastal, and marine ecosystems by 2030. Some have called 2022 the ocean’s “super year.” But the race is far from over.

We need to make 2023 a year of “super action,” so we can end the ocean emergency once and for all.

From effectively implementing the many legal and policy instruments related to the ocean, such as the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, which turned 40 last year.

To concluding the long-overdue agreement on marine biological diversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction, which cover over two-thirds of our ocean.

We are now into the third year of the UN Decade of Ocean Science.

By 2030, we must have achieved our goal of mapping 80 percent of the seabed.

We must see new partnerships among researchers, governments, and the private sector to support ocean research and sustainable ocean planning and management.

We must see investment in state-of-the-art, climate-resilient coastal infrastructure — from towns and villages, to port installations.

And to protect coastal communities and workers at sea from natural disasters, we must massively invest in technologies and capacities to reach our goal of ensuring universal global early-warning system coverage in the next five years.

Dear friends, ending the ocean emergency is a race we must win.

And by working as one, it’s a race we can win. Let’s rescue the Sustainable Development Goals, including SDG 14. Let’s all become the champions the ocean needs.

Let’s end the ocean emergency and preserve and value this precious blue gift for our children and grandchildren.