Treaty for protection of High seas has been agreed upon by countries after 20 years of negotiations

A historic oceans treaty has been accepted by nearly 200 countries in a meeting at the headquarters of United Nations in New York, after weeks of negotiations. The treaty briefly deals with the conservation of marine life and high seas. It was difficult to assemble countries on a single deal but ultimately the goal is achieved, said information. The conference President Rena Lee of Singapore in a statement said, ‘In Singapore, we like to go on learning journeys, and this has been the learning journey of a lifetime. The success is also yours’. She thanked delegates for their commitment and dedication.     

Shrinking of sea areas has become a matter of urgency for countries after approximately 20 years of advocacy. Funding and Fishing surfaced as a significant subject of disagreement between countries and continued for several years, before this year. However, Political Adviser for Greenpeace, Veronica Frank immediately wants the plan to put in action as soon as possible, considering the past. ‘We are really happy. The world is so divided and to see multilateralism supported is so important. What’s really important is now to use this tool to develop this 30×30 target into force really quickly’, she said. As per the agreement, the target is to conserve 30% of high seas by 2030.

At present, 1.2% of high seas are protected and the rest consist more than one third of earth’s area. Information says, half area of the earth is covered by high seas, which is not claimed by any country. It becomes a challenging matter for countries in terms to protect an open ocean that especially does not comes within any country’s boundary. James Matthew has studied concisely about marine lives and is also environmentalist expert. He believes to agree on a treaty like this by 200 countries itself is an achievement for all of us. He said, ‘Environment, conservation of biodiversity, endangered species is not top level matters for administrations, and we have understood it now. These matters have to take back seat for subjects like politics, corruption, technology development, economy to come forward. I am very thankful of United Nations who prioritizes this discussion in front of the countries and make it reach to a productive conclusion, despite the difference of opinions around it.’

He further added that nation’s actions concerning environmental crisis shows their developed understanding around this matter. The treaty attracted attention of several organizations working in this sector. One of them, Pew Charitable Trust called it ‘landmark international agreement’, European Commissioner of the environment called it as a ‘historic moment for the ocean’, whereas the Head of the African Group and ambassador and deputy permanent representative to the UN for legal affairs said it was ‘robust and ambitious’. According to Matthew, the treaty will help marine lives from high risk of exploitation. ‘Since high seas were not considered to be protected, large areas of water bodies were open for shipping, fishing, research that put marine lives in danger including climate change, shipping traffic and overfishing. Taking them under protection agreement will help these areas to be restricted from doing such activities’, he said.

Legal tools will be established through this treaty for marine protection, sanctuaries conservation and maintaining ocean’s biodiversity crisis free. It will also direct environmental assessments to evaluate potential damage of commercial activities like deep sea mining, before they start and pledge by signatories to share ocean resources, as per CNN report.

What are other threats oceans are facing by humans? Matthew told EAT news that we rely completely on water bodies. He said, ‘Fishing and shipping provides us food and let the trade business goes smoothly. Apart from this, humans are excessively digging deeper in oceans for genetic resources. Not only it stops here, plants and marine animals are also targeted for pharmaceutical industries. This has pressured the water bodies to an extent, that they have become highly vulnerable with no other alternates.’ He while discussing the urgency of this treaty said, ‘Only 1.2% of international waters are protected, and only 0.8% is identified as highly protected. When we know the surface area of oceans approximately covers half of the earth. If the treaty work as it is planned, then by 2030, we will be able to improvise little percentage of environmental crisis and could better the condition for marine lives’.

Media reports say key members in settling the deal were US, China, UK and EU. Ironically US is currently the largest shareholder in emitting greenhouse gases with some 20% of the global total of carbon dioxide alone. Whereas countries like Finland, Sweden, Morocco, Denmark are constantly working on reducing their carbon emissions with recovering and resilience plans.

The treaty will come in action, once involved countries will present it in their parliaments to let it pass. Witnessing global powers coming together for a single cause proclaims the gravity of the situation.