All the way back in January 2017, we made a list of what we hoped the year would deliver. 2016 had been a good Ocean year and we were pretty revved up as our 5 Ocean wishes had almost completely come true. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for 2017. Some good Ocean-related things did happen – check out our end-of-year blog – but in some cases no Ocean protection progress was made, and in others, things even went backwards. Let’s take a closer look at that wishlist:
Further announcements of large-scale marine protection, including in the Antarctic and Arctic. In the Antarctic: NO. In the Arctic: YES – an agreement to stop commercial fishing in the high seas (read on for more info); and protections for Lancaster Sound in Canada.
Formal negotiations for a UN high seas biodiversity Treaty given the green light. YES (read on for more info).
Breakthrough at the World Trade Organization with an agreement that deals with eliminating harmful fishing subsidies once and for all. NO (you know the drill now – read on for more info).
Heavy fuel oil banned in the Arctic. NO – but discussions are ongoing.
So, what has 2018 got in store for the Ocean? Here’s an overview of some of the predicted big Ocean trends relating to the high seas and the curbing of carbon emissions from shipping. Hopefully, there will be further large-scale Ocean protections, including in Antarctica, and more efforts to address Ocean risks, from climate change to fighting marine plastic waste. We’ll keep you updated on all these trends in the coming months. Remember, knowledge is our power, so please send anything you think is important for other Ocean junkies to know to navigator_info@oceanunite.org.
Precautionary measures and legal threats at SPRFMO
Sparks will be flying at the 6th Meeting of the South Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Organization (SPRFMO) in Lima, Peru from 30 January to 3 February, when a new measure designed to protect vulnerable marine ecosystems will be discussed. The measure put forward by the Australian and New Zealand governments is the result of a number of scientific workshops and introduces both a precautionary approach to spatial management – predicting where vulnerable ecosystems are found – and a “move-on” rule for bottom-trawlers, as required by the United Nations General Assembly resolutions. The New Zealand fishing industry are furious and have formally threatened to sue the New Zealand government if the measure is adopted, in order to stop Read More "their access rights to bottom trawling on the High Seas in the SPRFMO area being further eroded", as they see it.
However, the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition – a group of NGOs working to ensure the protection of deep sea habitats – has urged SPRFMO members in its briefing paper not to let the threat of legal action stop the meeting from finalising and adopting the measure. It’s a result of an extensive series of consultations and it would be a sorry state of affairs if the interests of a segment of the fishing industry trumped the health of the Ocean and the will of the UN General Assembly.
Also on the agenda are a performance review and a boarding and inspection programme.
2018 – time for coral reefs to get more international attention In the last Navigator (all the way back in 2017), we gave a heads up that 2018 will be the International Year of the Reef. Seeing as coral reefs are so incredibly important, we thought we’d give another shout out for them, especially as we just read another study that said the window for saving the world's coral reefs is rapidly closing. Watch out for coral reefs at the Oscars on the 4th March, with film-maker Jeff Orlowski’s film “Chasing Corals” short-listed for a nomination for best documentary! The film follows scientists, film-makers and Ocean lovers telling the story of the heart-wrenching death of parts of the Great Barrier Reef. Read Richard Branson’s blog on Why the Ocean needs an Oscar. The film is available on Netflix, so take a break from your latest series and enjoy this truly amazing and terrifying film, then tell the world how brilliant it is and add to the Oscar buzz. And why not get your country to sign up to the Coral Reef Life Declaration, if it hasn't done so already?
MPA Action Agenda is calling for Push Project applicationsfor small-scale funding for projects that address local and regional bottlenecks for the establishment and effective management of MPAs. The deadline is 31st January.
Nominations are being accepted for the Marine Conservation Institute’s 2018 Global Ocean Refuge awards. Click here to learn more and nominate a MPA!
See how you can support the March for the Ocean, scheduled for the 9th June 2018, which will hopefully be the largest mass movement for the Ocean to date.
Support Ocean education in classrooms worldwide by donating to the Kickstarter Campaign to support the WORLD OCEAN EXPLORER. The goal is to raise $50,000 by the 7th February.
World Ocean Summit and high-level Asamblea focus on delivering and financing Ocean health
The Economist’s World Ocean Summit will meet again for the 5th time, this year in Mexico from the 7–9th March. While 2017 was the year of “big promises”, as seen from all the voluntary commitments made at The Ocean and Our Ocean conferences, The Economist has said that “2018 must be about delivery”. The meeting will look at how to make sure these pledges by governments, industry and NGOs are turned into reality. After all the focus on high-level announcements, we are glad the attention will now be on implementation and accountability.
From the 6–7th March, Ocean Unite will help convene the Asamblea del Océano Pacífico, an invitation-only high-level event held in conjunction with The Economist. It will bring together Ministers of Finance and Environment from North, Central and South American Pacific Rim countries to discuss “The Ocean in a Changing Climate”, and to encourage global leadership to put in place Ocean conservation measures that benefit people, economies and the planet. In recent years, some of these countries have taken great strides in Ocean protection with large-scale MPAs and action on curbing plastic waste. This meeting will hopefully help encourage the countries present to put in place futher policies, and funding, to help deliver concrete actions at the national, regional and international level. More on this as we get closer to the Summit.
Failure to agree ban on harmful fisheries subsidies at WTO
To say it’s a major disappointment is an understatement: despite being supposedly one of the "low-hanging fish" of this year’s World Trade Organization’s Ministerial Conference, the world’s governments were still not able to agree on how to get rid of harmful fisheries subsidies that contribute to overfishing and illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing, a failure that The Economist called "baffling and shameful". According to BLOOM and the Varda Group, within just a few hours of the start of discussions, a small handful of governments had severely watered down the draft decision. India reportedly blocked a deal, arguing it needed to protect subsidies for its many low-income fisherfolk. However, the country only spends US$499 million per year on subsidies and 83% of that goes to industrial trawlers. According to The Economist “fish were the unfortunate bycatch” of a disagreement between India and the USA on lifting restrictions on stockpiling food.
The meeting did, however, agree to continue to engage constructively with the fisheries subsidies negotiations, with the aim of adopting an agreement in 2019. The ministerial decision on fisheries subsidies is available here. This is still within the 2020 sustainable development goal deadline, but it’s another 2 wasted years – time that the Ocean and marine life doesn’t have spare, particularly after 20 years of discussions. Some are still confident that a solution is within reach, and all eyes are on the Second Oceans Forum, which is being held in Geneva on the 16–17th July 2018.
Industry is also taking action with the NextWave consortium, which includes companies such as Dell and General Motors, announcing efforts to build a supply chain that intercepts plastic waste at Indonesian trash hotspots and recycles it into anything from packaging to furniture. Perhaps 2018 will be the year when the focus shifts to removing and reducing plastic from the production stream. The 3Rs put recycling last, so c’mon business leaders, it’s time to focus on a reduce and reuse approach first.
High seas governance is on course
We knew it was on the cards, but on the 24th December 2017 (an early Christmas present!) the UN General Assembly made the historic decision to formally adopt the recommendation by the high seas PrepCom to start negotiations for a new UN landmark treaty to protect the high seas. More than 140 nations co-sponsored the resolution, which contains strong provisions allowing NGOs to be able to participate meaningfully in the negotiations, something that unfortunately can’t be taken for granted. A collective "woohoo!" was heard around the world from the Africa Group, G77, Small Island Developing States, the European Union and members of the High Seas Alliance.
This will be one of the big Ocean things happening in 2018. In April, there’ll be a preliminary meeting to organise the logistics of the discussions, including who’ll be the Chair and lead discussions. Negotiations will start from 4–17th September 2018, and hopefully conclude by 2020. A key issue being discussed is ensuring a preliminary working draft treaty text is developed in advance of the meeting. Conservation advocates from the High Seas Alliance are keen on this approach to making the most of the meeting in September. However, not all countries are on the same page, preferring a slower approach to a Treaty. What’s clear from the number of co-sponsors and all the work done to date, not to mention the wave of science showing increased threats to human health, is that we need to inject a bit of sustainable rocket fuel into this UN process. Buckle your seat belts and prepare for lift-off!
Arctic fisheries highs – and oil drilling lows
Finally, there's some good news coming from the Arctic: in December 2017 Arctic countries and distant water fishing nations agreed to keep the 1.1 million km2 of the Central Arctic Ocean off limits to commercial fishing for at least 16 years, a move strongly welcomed by scientists and environmentalists. In 2015 the 5 Arctic countries – Canada, Denmark, Norway, Russia and the US – signed the Oslo Declaration that agreed to no commercial fishing in the area. Since then they’ve been in talks with distant water fishing nations Japan, China, South Korea and the EU, to ensure they too respect the area as off-limits to fishing.
The moratorium will automatically be renewed in 2033, and then every 5 years after that, unless a country objects or fisheries management structures have been put in place. This time out will enable more scientific research in the region to better understand the impacts of climate change on its fish stocks and Arctic marine life. A precautionary suspension to protect marine life. What’s not to like?
But our joy at good news in the Arctic was short-lived with a range of setbacks. US President Trump has re-opened US Arctic waters to oil drilling and elsewhere. Greenpeace and the Nature and Youth Group lost their joint lawsuit against the Norwegian government; this argued that the awarding of new oil exploration licenses violates the countries’ right to a safe and healthy environment. Statoil announced it's moving full-steam ahead with its flagship Arctic oil project in Norway. And scientific reports confirmed that the Arctic continued in 2017 to warm at double the rate of the global temperature increase. Given the Ocean has absorbed about 93% of the heat from our carbon emissions, and we can see the impacts and increased hazards and risks from a warming and acidifying Ocean, we do wonder how these types of policies make any sense in the short or longer term.
Remember to pass on any of your ocean news to navigator_info@oceanunite.org
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