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UN PhotoUnited Nations Ocean Conference - 2nd Plenary Meeting
Speakers Underline Urgency of Expanding Protected Coastal Areas, Tackling Sea Acidification, as United Nations Ocean Conference Continues...
Speakers emphasized the urgency of expanding protected coastal and marine areas — one of the targets of Goal 14 of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development — as well as tackling the problem of ocean acidification during partnership dialogues on the second day of the United Nations Ocean Conference.
Tommy Remengesau, President of Palau and co-chair of a morning discussion on the theme “Managing, protecting, conserving and restoring marine and coastal ecosystems”, said “we should increase our ambition” and protect at least 30 per cent of coastal and marine areas by 2030 — compared with the 10 per cent set out in the Sustainable Development Goals.
He said that for his Pacific island country, the best option was to set aside 80 per cent of its waters — 190 square miles of ocean — as a marine sanctuary, with the remaining 20 per cent available for domestic fishing.
Within that setting, however, Palau still had to deal with management, monitoring, protection and restoration issues, he noted, adding that multi-country and multi-stakeholder partnerships were needed in order to tackle illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing, human and drug trafficking and harmful fisheries subsidies.
Silvia Velo, Under-Secretary of State in the Ministry of Environment, Land and Sea of Italy, co-chairing the same meeting, said that while marine protected area coverage had grown over the decade, their geographic distribution was uneven, with more needed in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, South-East Asia and in small island developing States.
Cristiana Paşca Palmer, Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity, said during a panel discussion that the world was well on the way to achieving the 10 per cent target, noting that since the agreement came into force in 1993, such areas had increased 10 fold to 5.7 per cent today. Much remained to be done, however, to improve the management of those areas and ensure that they were representative of many ocean ecosystems, she added.
In an ensuing interactive debate, participants from States and civil society touched upon a broad range of measures for creating and sustaining protected areas, with the Prime Minister of Palau announcing that, upon his return home, its Parliament would set aside 16 per cent of its exclusive economic zone as a marine protected area in which no industrial activity would be permitted.
From Latin America and the Caribbean, the representative of Grenada told how conservation was being mainstreamed into its wider economic strategy, with the private sector playing a key role as demonstrated by an underwater sculpture park described by National Geographic as a wonder of the world.
France’s delegate — a sailor who said she felt responsible for the rubbish she encountered on every one of her sea voyages — said the good health of the oceans depended on implementation of the Paris Agreement, given their acknowledged role in regulating climate.
From civil society, the representative of the Drammeh Institute advocated enshrining the eco-theological beliefs of more than 200 million people in Haiti, Cameroon, the United States and Ghana into marine management issues.
The afternoon featured a partnership dialogue on minimizing and addressing ocean acidification — a phenomenon with a potential for considerable ecological and socioeconomic consequences running alongside other climate-driven changes such as ocean warming, sea-level rise and deoxygenation.
Prince Albert II of Monaco, who co-chaired the session alongside Agostinho Mondlane, Minister of the Sea, Inland Waters and Fisheries, Mozambique, said acidification, while not a well-known phenomenon, had severe consequences. Noting that his country was home to the Ocean Acidification International Coordination Centre, he said understanding acidification required global and local approaches to decision-making. He added that limiting greenhouse gas emissions towards a carbon-free economy should be a common goal, as the effects of such efforts on acidification would be a slow process. Indeed, climate change and acidification must be fought holistically, he emphasized.
Mr. Mondlane, noting that Mozambique had one of the world’s longest coastlines, said increased acidification, with its adverse impacts on marine resources, had brought about a huge awakening, as it affected people’s survival. “The solutions must come from us,” he said, adding that the phenomenon risked undermining his country’s efforts to develop mussels, bivalves and prawns as a means of alternative livelihoods for its people.
The Conference — officially titled the United Nations Conference to Support the Implementation of Sustainable Development Goal 14: Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development — will reconvene at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, 7 June.
