Treaty advances to protect high seas
UN members OK first-ever pact to protect marine life
UNITED NATIONS — Members of the United Nations adopted the first-ever treaty to protect marine life in the high seas on Monday, with the UN’s chief hailing the historic agreement as giving the ocean “a fighting chance.”
Delegates from the 193 member nations burst into applause and then stood up in a sustained standing ovation when Singapore’s ambassador on ocean issues, Rena Lee, who presided over the negotiations, banged her gavel after hearing no objections to the treaty’s approval.
Oceans produce most of the oxygen we breathe and absorb carbon dioxide, which makes them increasingly critical in reducing carbon emissions that fuel global warming. Yet, currently only 1 percent of the vast ocean areas are protected.
A treaty to protect biodiversity in waters outside national boundaries, known as the high seas, covering nearly half of Earth’s surface, had been under discussion for more than 20 years, but efforts repeatedly stalled until March. That’s when delegates to an intergovernmental conference established by the UN General Assembly agreed on a treaty, which was then subject to legal scrutiny and translated into the UN’s six official languages.
The new treaty will be opened for signatures on Sept. 20, during the annual meeting of world leaders at the General Assembly, and it will take effect once it is ratified by 60 countries.
The treaty will create a new body to manage conservation of ocean life and establish marine protected areas in the high seas. It also establishes ground rules for conducting environmental impact assessments for commercial activities in the oceans.
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told delegates that the adoption of the treaty comes at a critical time, with the oceans under threat on many fronts.
Climate change is disrupting weather patterns and ocean currents, raising sea temperatures, “and altering marine ecosystems and the species living there,” he said, and marine biodiversity “is under attack from overfishing, over-exploitation, and ocean acidification.”
“Over one-third of fish stocks are being harvested at unsustainable levels,” the UN chief said. “And we are polluting our coastal waters with chemicals, plastics, and human waste.”
Guterres said the treaty is vital to address these threats, and he urged all countries to spare no efforts to ensure that it is signed and ratified as soon as possible, stressing that “this is critical to addressing the threats facing the ocean.”
The treaty also establishes principles to share “marine genetic resources” discovered by scientists in international waters, a key demand of developing countries who insisted that the fruits of such discoveries could not be solely controlled by richer countries with money to finance expeditions to look for potentially lucrative ingredients for medicine and cosmetics.
After the treaty’s approval, the Group of 77, the UN coalition of 134 mainly developing nations and China, called it “an exceedingly important day for biodiversity,” praising their successful struggle to achieve benefit-sharing in the final text as well as funding to help implement the treaty when ratified.
The Alliance of Small Island States, some of whose members fear that climate change and rising seas can obliterate their countries, said they have been championing a treaty for decades, and its adoption will have far-reaching implications “on our livelihoods, cultures, and economies.”
But Russia said it “distances itself from the consensus on the text of the agreement,” which it called “unacceptable,” saying it “undermines the provisions of the most important acting international agreements, including the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.”