OCEAN SDG

In 2015 the world’s governments agreed to a set of global Sustainable Development Goals, including UN Ocean Goal Number 14, to set their focus for the coming decades on efforts to fight poverty and create a greener, fairer planet. SDG 14 recognises the critical role of the Ocean for our planet and humanity. ACTION is the key word here. The Ocean is everybody’s business and all of us (the public, governments and businesses) need to take concrete action and invest in its future health. This will enable Ocean life to regenerate having benefits that extend across communities and beyond borders for generations to come.

TALKING POINTS

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• In September 2015, world leaders adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to combat poverty and promote a greener, fairer future, replacing the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which expired at the end of 2015.
• The 17 goals and 169 targets were debated by UN member states, civil society and business representatives for three years. Implementation of the sustainable development agenda began on 1 January 2016.
• The UN has estimated that the new goals could cost as much as US$172.5tn over the 15‐year timeframe.
• The Ocean was given a marginal role within the MDGs, despite its significant contribution to sustainable development. However, things have changed. Led by Small Island States, SDG 14 is singularly focused on the Ocean: “Conserve and sustainably use the Oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development”.
• SDG 14 recognizes that poverty eradication and sustainable development cannot be ended without safeguarding our Ocean and seas.

The Targets

• The targets under the goal reflect common sense. Translated into plain English, they are (click here for the full UN text):
  • Reduce sea pollution.
  • Protect and nurture all sea life so that the Ocean can continue to support us.
  • Reduce the damage caused by Ocean acidification, which results from CO
  • Look after stocks of fish so that they continue to feed us into the future.
  • Use scientific knowledge and existing laws to protect life in the most vulnerable areas of the seas.
  • Stop governments supporting overfishing and illegal fishing though their use of fisheries subsidies.
  • Help the poorest countries use the sea’s resources wisely so that it brings them benefits well into the future.
  • Improve scientific understanding of the Ocean, to maximise its health and contribution to world economies.
  • Help local fisherman to maintain their livelihoods.
  • Make sure that existing laws are used to conserve Ocean resources and make new ones to close the gaps.
• The Ocean SDG14 is relevant to many other goals. Without a healthy Ocean we won’t be able to:
  • End hunger, improve nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture;
  • Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth;
  • Promote sustainable infrastructure and industrialization and foster innovation;
  • Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable;
  • Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns or halt biodiversity loss;
  • Empower women and girls.

The Importance

• An Ocean SDG places the critical role of the Ocean to our planet and humanity squarely in the post-2015 development agenda, and provides a framework to develop new measures to tackle existing governance gaps like those on the high seas.
• An Ocean SDG alone is not enough to guarantee a secure future for the global Ocean but it garners valuable recognition of the importance of the Ocean, and helps build momentum and the need to prioritise resources.
• By reducing the pressure from many of the direct stressors on Ocean life from human activities – like industrial fishing – the SDG Ocean targets will help to support resilience and abundance, regenerating Ocean life with benefits that extend across communities and beyond borders.
• The Ocean is like the earth’s circulatory system; it provides us with food, fresh water, energy, medicine and the oxygen in every second breath we take. It links people and culture, countries and lives and allows goods and services to be transported around the world.
• What we also tend to forget, is that the Earth is one living system. Both the physical and biological processes of the Ocean play a key role in the water cycle, the carbon cycle, and climate variability. The microscopic plants that live in the Ocean are responsible for almost half the oxygen we inhale.
• As a natural carbon sink, the Ocean absorbs approximately 25% of all the CO₂ emitted by human activities. Scientists now understand that this comes with a cost to its overall health. The increasing amount of carbon dioxide (CO₂) in the air is reacting with the Ocean to alter its chemistry. (See Ocean Unite’s talking points on Healthy Ocean, Healthy Climate for more details on the effect climate change is having on our Ocean).
• Prompt action to combat climate change will be the single most important action we can take to help secure its health. We need to curb carbon emissions, in particular CO₂, and limit climate change damage to ensure a healthy, productive Ocean and to be able to deliver upon the other goals.
• Saving the Ocean, 70% of the planet, and those who live from and by it, requires monumental shifts in thinking and action. The Ocean has an amazing ability to regenerate itself. We need to help it, and the targets set in the Ocean SDG will help us do just that. The target to protect 10% of the Ocean by 2020 while an excellent milestone, does not mesh with the current best available science which supports strongly protecting at least 30% of the Ocean by 2030. In this case, we must all strive to follow the science and view the 10% target as a milestone towards this bigger goal.
• We also must address the fragmented approach that is currently driving Ocean decline. A concerted effort is required, underpinned by key reforms in global Ocean governance and implemented by governments, civil society and the private sector so that the words on paper become action in the water.
• Achieving these global goals is not an option: they are a prerequisite for promoting a safer, healthier and fairer world. By giving our Ocean and seas a break from the current trend of business-as-usual and designing a new way forward, we can benefit from it without stripping bare its assets.

What needs to happen? Progress and Implementation

• While the SDGs are not legally binding, they do represent the overarching development norms and priorities of the international community, adopted by consensus.
• The implementation of the Ocean SDG could prove vital in providing pathways for more effective “systems of governance” for the global Ocean commons.
• From 5–9^th June 2017, the governments of Fiji and Sweden hosted a high-level UN meeting in New York, known as ‘The Ocean Conference” to support further the implementation of Ocean SDG 14 and agree a “Call for Action”.
• The meeting formally adopted a Call for Action, Partnership dialogues and a Registry of voluntary commitments. By the end of the meeting there were more than 1,300 voluntary commitments made by governments and organizations, ranging from announcements to expand MPA coverage, including one of the largest MPAs in Africa, to action on fighting plastic pollution, greater shark and ray protection, seafood companies pledging to fish sustainably, private sector partnerships pledging to raise awareness on the Ocean crisis, and many more.
• The meeting also yielded substantial networking, info-sharing, alliance building and growing awareness of the plight of the Ocean.
• Kenya and Portugal have offered to host a follow-up meeting on SDG 14 in 2020.
• In September 2017, the UN Secretary General appointed a Special Envoy for the Ocean, H.E. Peter Thomson (former Fijian UN Ambassador and most recently the President of the UN General Assembly). Notably this was also one of the recommendations of the Global Ocean Commission. This Special Envoy, while a focal point for the Ocean related activities in the UN, is charged with facilitating the delivery of the SDG14 targets.
• In December 2017, the Special Envoy for the Ocean formed nine ‘Communities of Action’ which have been framed around the targets of SDG14. Each community has a designated focal point that works with the UN and members of the communities to follow up on existing commitments, and spurring the registration of new commitments by all stakeholders.
• Real commitments need to be made that include the financing and resources to deliver the targets, as well as regular accountability moments that show that we are walking the walk and acting on our commitments.
• We need to be ambitious and safeguard food security, people’s livelihoods and marine life by strongly protecting at least 30% of the Ocean by 2030, and ensuring the remaining 70% is sustainably managed.
• We need to enhance the ocean’s resilience to continue to deal with the impacts of climate change, by lowering greenhouse gas emissions, in particular CO₂ and by reducing other stressors on the ocean (i.e. overfishing, destructive fishing practices, habitat degradation, and pollution).
• We need to end perverse subsidies that enable illegal fishing and overfishing and secure sustainable access for coastal and indigenous communities dependent on the Ocean for their food security and livelihoods.
• We need to achieve 100% renewable energy by 2050 at the very latest, and bring legal protection to high seas biodiversity through a new UN Treaty. We don’t need to debate what needs to happen anymore – we just need to get on and do it!