The United Nations adopted on Monday June 19, a groundbreaking international treaty, marking the world’s first of its kind, aimed at safeguarding the high seas. This landmark environmental agreement is specifically designed to preserve distant ecosystems that play a crucial role in supporting humanity.
The world’s first international treaty to protect the high seas was adopted Monday at the United Nations, a landmark environmental accord designed to protect remote ecosystems vital to humanity.
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres hailed as a “historic achievement” the treaty that will establish a legal framework to extend swathes of environmental protections to international waters, which make up more than 60 percent of the world’s oceans.
Scientists have increasingly come to realize the importance of oceans, which produce most of the oxygen we breathe, limit climate change by absorbing CO2, and host rich areas of biodiversity, often at the microscopic level.
A key tool in the treaty will be the ability to create protected marine areas in international waters.
Currently, only about one percent of the high seas are protected by any sort of conservation measures.
The treaty is seen as crucial to countries protecting 30 percent of the world’s oceans and lands by 2030, as agreed by world governments in a separate historic accord reached in Montreal in December.
The treaty, officially known as the treaty on “Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction” or BBNJ, also introduces requirements to carry out environmental impact studies for proposed activities to be carried out in international waters.
Such activities, while not listed in the text, would include anything from fishing and maritime transport to more controversial pursuits, like deep-sea mining or even geoengineering programs aimed at fighting global warming.
The treaty also establishes principles for sharing the benefits of “marine genetic resources” (MGR) collected by scientific research in international waters, a sticking point that almost derailed last-minute negotiations in March.
Developing countries, which often don’t have the money to finance such expeditions, fought for benefit-sharing rights, hoping to not get left behind by what many see as a huge future market in the commercialization of MGR, especially by pharmaceutical and cosmetic companies searching for “miracle molecules.”
It remains to be seen how many countries will decide to come on board.
Khalil Wakim, with AFP
