On Wednesday 28 May, the European Union ratified the Treaty of the High Seas, a historic international agreement designed to protect the oceans, tackle environmental degradation, curb climate change and halt biodiversity loss, announced the European Commission on the same day (see EUROPE 13647/9).
The EU’s ratification comes just a few days before the United Nations Ocean Conference (UNOC), scheduled to take place in Nice from 9 to 13 June.
Furthermore, six EU Member States have ratified the treaty: Cyprus, Finland, Hungary, Latvia, Portugal and Slovenia. France and Spain had already ratified the text earlier this year.
With these new members, the treaty now has 28 parties. The EU and its Member States are emphasising their willingness to speed up the agreement’s entry into force, which requires a total of 60 ratifications.
The Treaty of the High Seas, adopted in 2023 under the auspices of the UN, will notably allow for the creation of vast marine protected areas and contribute to the objective of preserving at least 30% of the seas and oceans by 2030. As part of this, the EU has announced a €40 million package to help its partners in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific ratify and implement the agreement. At present, less than 1% of areas on the high seas are formally protected.
The organisations OceanCare, Oceana and High Seas Alliance have welcomed the EU’s ratification of this treaty.
On Wednesday 4 June, the Commission is due to adopt its communication on the ‘European Oceans Pact’ (see EUROPE 13646/11).
Meanwhile, on 28 May, the European Investment Bank (EIB) welcomed the launch of the United Nations Ocean Investment Protocol, a new global framework aimed at aligning financial flows and business practices with the transition to a sustainable ocean economy. The Ocean Investment Protocol provides financial institutions, insurance companies, maritime industries, governments and development banks with a clear ‘roadmap’ to jointly foster the growth of a sustainable ocean economy and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), in particular SDG 14 (‘Life below water’).
As the leading lender to the blue economy among development finance institutions, the EIB Group has committed €10.6 billion to blue economy projects between 2020 and 2024, mobilising a total of €43 billion in investments. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)