What is ocean sustainability?
The ocean and climate change are closely intertwined: the ocean and its ecosystems are essential for regulating the climate. At the same time, they are greatly affected by climate change.
Action to preserve both the ocean and the climate must therefore go hand in hand.
The alarm about the impact of climate change on the ocean was first raised by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. It emphasised the need to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and take sustained and decisive action.
How will the EU achieve this?
The EU has set a legal requirement for ‘climate neutrality’ (net zero emissions) by 2050, in line with the Paris Agreement on climate change. It is committed to reducing its greenhouse emissions from maritime activities and making further progress on climate adaptation. The Commission has proposed a range of measures to ensure that EU maritime transport helps achieve this goal.
In a similar vein, the EU will continue to decarbonise the fishing sector, to reduce dependency on fossil fuels (primarily diesel). This includes exploring mitigation measures and fishing strategies/gears that reduce emissions and improve energy use efficiency.
The EU considers offshore wind and ocean energy to be part of the solution for achieving its 2050 goal, in line with the EU strategy on offshore renewable energy.
Nature-based solutions can also provide climate change mitigation and adaptation by increasing carbon uptake and storage.
The EU is committed to stopping pollution of all kinds, in particular land-based sources of marine litter.
Since its plastics strategy was adopted in 2018, the EU has been a driving force in tackling plastic pollution worldwide.
It’s also determined to drastically reduce land-based pollution from nutrients and chemical pesticides, and to take decisive steps, as outlined in its zero pollution action plan.
The EU is scaling up its efforts to tackle problems with flag states acting as ‘open registers’. Some fishing and maritime transport operators register their vessels with these states to take advantage of their weak compliance with international obligations or loose control over the vessels registered under their flags.
In line with its blue economy approach, the EU will seek to promote economic growth and improve livelihoods, while ensuring the sustainable use of marine resources and the well-being of coastal communities.
Seafood makes an important contribution to EU food and nutrition security. As the world’s largest import market for seafood products, the EU is striving to limit market entry to only products that are sustainably sourced and produced.
The steadily increasing demand for ocean use requires integrated maritime spatial planning (MSP), which takes due account of the interests of all maritime sectors and their impact on the environment.
The EU has gained significant experience in this respect and is working together with UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission to promote MSP internationally through MSPGlobal.
Spatial planning promotes transboundary cooperation and helps minimise territorial conflicts and manage cumulative impacts worldwide.
