UN Ocean Conference 2025: Big Promises, Global Funding, and the Push for Ocean Protection

0:00 I am back from the UN Oceans Conference in Nice, France. Beautiful country, a lot of stuff announced, including a lot of money that was made for ocean conservation, but not enough to really protect the ocean. Quite a bit shy. We're also going to talk about a lot of announcements that were made in terms of high seas treaty, in terms of the global plastic pollution treaties and the commitments for that, as well as marine protected areas announcements. So we're going to talk all about that on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. Let's start the show. Hey everybody, welcome back to another exciting episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. I'm your host, Andrew Lewin. This is the podcast where you find out what's happening with the ocean, how you could speak up for the ocean, what you can do to live for a better ocean by taking action.

0:44 On today's episode, we're going to be talking about my trip to Nice, France, not my 20th anniversary that I celebrated in these France with my wonderful wife, but we're going to be talking about the UN Oceans Conference, which is one of the things that I went to Nice for, not only spend a wonderful time with my wife, but also go to the conference, see what's happening, connect with friends, connect with colleagues and meet new people and new friends at these conferences, which I love to do. Now I'm going to just right off the bat, I'm going to say this was very different from the conferences that I normally go to. Now, normally there's science conferences that I go to, and this had a science component that was done the week before I went. I went from the 11th to the 15th. This lasted basically from the second to the 13th, but there was a lot of stuff that was said.

1:25 There was a lot of stuff done and it was a little bit different in terms that normally when you go to a conference that I normally go to, it's at one hotel. Either you stay in that hotel or you just walk to it from a different Airbnb or a hotel and you spend most of the time in different rooms and sessions and workshops, speaking with people, connecting with individuals and friends and colleagues and so forth, maybe potentially collaborating on new projects. And when you talk with that and you network, this was a little bit different, not the networking part. There was a lot of that, but the way everything was dispersed across the city, it was a little bit hectic. There was a blue zone, which all the delegations were there, like all the government delegations and the big announcements were done, which I'll talk about in just a sec. And then there was a green zone, which was open to the public. This has never happened before. This is the third time this conference is done. It never happened before in Barcelona. So this was cool that they opened it to the public.

2:11 There's drawings for kids. We could talk about startups. We talked about fishing. We talked about everything. There was a little presentations going around, but it was really cool. Show some B roll from some of the pictures and videos that I took the city of nice is absolutely gorgeous. There's a lot of water there to remind you to connect to the water. I got to jump in the water with my friend Angela Villa Gomez and a number of different people that I met there in the morning before my co-hosting session for the undertow that I co-founded started. And we had a great time there, but there were a lot of like, there's a green zone that you can go to. There was a lot of side events. So it made it pretty hectic to run around and it was hot. And so if you're wearing conference attire, it was very hot, very sticky. But it was a lot of fun to go to. But some of these announcements that I'm going to talk about, I'm going to interject as I recount these announcements were very interesting. I say to you, take it with a grain of salt. There's a lot of stuff that sounds really great, but don't hold your breath. A lot of what I've learned from a lot of these announcements by governments and different NGOs and stuff like that is like, I will believe it when I see it.

3:06 And that's all I'm going to say there, but it is in a positive direction, which is great. So we're going to talk about that. I'm going to run through it pretty quickly. There was some heavy financial commitments, including 3 billion euros from the European Investment Bank. And the European Asian Development Bank to tackle ocean plastic pollution through 2030, which is great. Not much detail in that, but that was great announcement. 2.5 billion US from the US Bank of Latin America and Caribbean CAF for sustainable marine investments from 2025 to 2030. There's a 119 million euro via World Bank for climate resilience in Guinea's coasts. There is 2 million euro for Mediterranean ecosystems in North Africa and 1.8 million euro to reinforce marine protected areas in Costa Rica and in the Mediterranean.

3:47 Which is great. And then we saw private investments when capital raised 160 million euro towards the Swen Blue Ocean 2 fund targeted 300 million euro for biodiversity focused startups, which is great to see. And then of course, bird life and philanthropic public investors committed to 8.7 billion euro over 5 years for ocean conservation. Now, if I say this, despite that influx, which was great to see, it still falls short of the estimated 175 billion dollars that are needed annually to protect the ocean. So that's the financial investments. Again, I'll believe that when I see all those investments be spent and all those projects come through, not all them will be successes, but at least there's money going into those projects.

4:28 And for the high seas, the treaty advances. So the high seas treaty needs to be ratified. They need 60 countries to ratify those. At the end of this conference, there were 50. They added 12 countries, bringing a total to 50. Just 10 short of the 60 needed to bring the high seas treaty into force. India did pledge to ratify soon, reinforcing the movement or momentum of the treaty. So they're going to be able to move forward with that. Once the 60 are reached, there will be 120 day countdown to an enactment with COP 1 scheduled within a year after that. The new marine protected areas and 30 by 30 progress, the niece declaration of reaffirmed support for 30 by 30. The target marking progress from 8% over 10% ocean protection. France, Costa Rica, Cabo Verde and others announced new marine protected areas including French Polynesians, 5 million dollars square kilometer sanctuary. The world's largest MPA when I say this though, take it with a grain of salt. Some of these MPAs still allow fishing activities like trawling into it.

5:25 The movie ocean, which I reviewed last week, really played an important role in the discussion of banning trawling within marine protected areas. That was brought up a number of times throughout UNOC, the United Nations Ocean Conference. And that was the purpose of the movie. It actually mentions the United Nations Ocean Conference at the end of that movie and the credits before the credits run. And so that was a big topic of discussion within that. I don't know what the announcements were around that. But the pressure was put on, especially on the UK for allowing that to happen. Deep sea mining caution. So a growing coalition of 37 countries called for moratorium on deep sea mining. Advocating a precautionary halt, pending better science and governance. French and international leaders underscore the need to pause on seabed mining. Because essentially we don't know a lot about the seabed.

6:07 I think we've mapped 25% of the seabed. We still have a lot more to do. And we just don't know what we're gonna screw up. And we're really good at screwing things up. So that's something that we have to be careful of. Combating plastics and ghost gear. So the Declaration urges against plastic pollution and ghost gear pushing the fisheries and agricultural organization and other organizations to ramp up efforts to clean those up. Countries like Australia recommitted to a global plastic treaty, which was gone through the process over the last year and a half. We've covered it on the podcast here. It didn't come out great. I'm not sure we'll have to cover where the plastic treaty is now, but they've done all their meetings. And I don't know if it was actually agreed upon. We'll have to talk about that soon. Confirm support for the high seas protection Australia. And vowed to ban bottom trawling in 30% of its waters by 2030, which I assume that will be marine protected areas given the 30 by 30 target.

6:54 Improving ocean governance and finance. So investors voice concerns that unclear regulations and weak ocean data are limiting the private sector involvement. Take that with a grain of salt, because usually it's the private investors and private sector that are causing a lot of the problems. I'd love to see more investment from the private sector and getting them to help clear up these regulations. But a lot of times it's usually private sector that's working against the private sector. And so that's an interesting comment by some of the people who were talking about these are the big announcements. These investors call for stronger governance, which is absolutely needed subsidy reform, which is absolutely needed a lot of subsidies in terms of money goes towards fishing subsidies and more transparent frameworks to mobilize private capital. Now, just to go back to the subsidies.

7:37 What I meant by fishing subsidies is giving it to the big industries, not the artisanal fishers. It's the big industries that usually get a lot of the subsidies and usually are the biggest problems. So now the NICE ocean action plan includes a political declaration and over 800 plus voluntary commitments from governments, UN agencies, scientists and NGOs, UN secretary general, I think that's how you pronounce the name, stress the shift from a plunder to protection, which is obvious. We need that shift. Urging world leaders to protect at least 30% of their oceans by 2030. Will that happen? It doesn't look like it's likely. I'm hopeful that it will get close. Hopefully there'll be a big push. But will we worry about that?

8:25 It's not going to be a paper MPa, it's got to be a proper MPa. It's got to work. It's got to be enforced. It's got to be managed properly. It's got to be done well. So bottom line is the nice conference achieve major boosts in financing, conservation targets and 3d progress. But funding is not going to help. It's got to be a way to deal with the achieve major boosts in financing, conservation targets, and treaty progress, but funding gaps still remain, and the scientists warned that the political decoration doesn't fully address damaging practices like harmful fishing, underwater noise, and the climate role of marine species. Still, global ambition is stronger, and with the high seas treaty nearing ratification, the world may finally be heading toward legally binding international ocean protection, which would be nice to see.

9:06 I just don't know if that's gonna happen. So we're gonna have to see if that happens, but the biggest thing that you could do is talk to your government representative to say how important these announcements are and how important it is for the government to be transparent in their commitments if they committed during UNOC. So find out if your country's committed. It'd be nice to see. If your country hasn't ratified the high seas treaty, you can actually go, I'll put the link in the show notes. You can actually go to a website, highseasalliance.org, and there's a treaty ratification table that shows if your country's ratified. It's really cool to see the progress. We're 10 away from ratification, which will be great. It has to be done by, I believe, January, 2026. So we're still about six months away from it happening in 10 more countries.

9:47 Canada, the US, Mexico have not done it in North America. That's a shame. I hope that they do it. I know Canada said they will. They'll sign, they signed onto it to agree to the treaty. They just haven't ratified it yet. And they just had an election. So hopefully they'll ratify it then. They've had a lot of political problems. Same with the US. And of course, all North America is just watching the US and see what it does. It's been fairly disruptive this year. So we'll see what happens. However, hopefully they will ratify it. It might be last minute, but hopefully they will ratify it. But that's the episode for today. I want to thank you so much for joining me on today's episode. I'd love to hear what you think. Put your comments down below. If you're watching this on YouTube, send me an email or fill out the contact sheet. If you want to get ahold of me, if you're listening to this audio, you go to speakupforblue.com forward slash contact.

10:31 It goes right to my, fill out the form. It goes right to my email. I'd love to hear your thoughts. Or you can DM me on Instagram at how to protect the ocean. That's at how to protect the ocean. I want to thank you so much for joining me on today's episode of the how to protect the ocean podcast. Have a great day. We'll talk to you next time and happy conservation.