fbpixel BBNJ Archives - Mission Blue

Blog Archives
New Hope Spot Champions for the Costa Rica Thermal Dome Emphasize Need for Sustainable High Seas Management

Featured image: Leatherback sea turtle (Dermochelys coriacea) (c) Fundación MarViva
Costa Rica, Tropical Pacific Ocean

The Costa Rica Thermal Dome (CRTD) is considered a deeply important place in the high seas of the Eastern Tropical Pacific Ocean (ETPO). Here, strong upwelling events provide high concentrations of nutrients for creatures like blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus), scalloped hammerhead sharks (Sphyrna lewini), Hawksbill sea turtles (Eretmochelys imbricata), and giant manta rays (Mobula birostris). (Broenkow, 1965; Jiménez, 2016). Megafauna like sea turtles rely on these waters to migrate and mate. As the Dome is located in the high seas, no one country holds claim to it – nor can protect the threatened marine life within. However, the new Hope Spot Champions have bigger plans for the Dome.…

Posted in .Homepage, Dr. Sylvia Earle, Featured, mission blue, Partner Stories, Uncategorized |

Leave a comment
UN Meeting Offers Hope for High Seas Protection

Things are looking up for the high seas after last week’s deliberations at United Nations Headquarters in New York City. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and President of the United Nations General Assembly Sam Kahamba Kutesa convened a meeting with States Members of the United Nations, intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations and parties to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) for four days of negotiations concerning the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity beyond areas of national jurisdiction (BBNJ). The meeting concluded early Saturday morning with a formal recommendation for the UN General Assembly to develop a legally binding agreement to protect ocean life in the high seas.
The high seas make up approximately 64% of the global ocean (nearly half of Earth’s surface) – a huge patchwork of regions lying outside of any country’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ).…

Posted in mission blue |

1 Comment
BREAKING: Dr. Sylvia Earle Boldly Addresses the UN To Urge Legal Protection for High Seas

Dr. Sylvia Earle addressed the United Nations Tuesday afternoon, urging the body to take action and implement an agreement that would bring law and order to the High Seas — an area half the size of our planet that is currently plundered and polluted with abandon.
Read Dr. Sylvie Earle’s bold remarks below. She’s right: the ten year olds are watching!
Thank you,  Co-Chairs, for the privilege of speaking officially on behalf of Mission Blue, and unofficially, for those who cannot speak for themselves – the children of today and for  all of those in the future – our descendants who will from their place in the future either applaud or condemn our actions – or lack of actions – concerning establishing governance – a strong and meaningful implementing agreement under UNCLOS for biodiversity of half the world, the high seas – the ocean beyond national jurisdiction. …

Posted in mission blue |

6 Comments
Open Seas Teem with Life, Invisible and Invincible

Too often, we see the open ocean like the space between stars.
We imagine a void, vast and hollow, characterized by emptiness and populated by ghosts. Water becomes a medium, a barrier, something crossed en route to something of substance. To the sea we consign the ashes of our dead, symbolically releasing them from this world as though the watery realm weren’t part of it.
It is, of course, very much part of our world, and it is far from empty. In fact, the open ocean comprises planet Earth’s most powerful bio-engine. Though its inhabitants can barely be seen and have only recently come to science’s attention, they form an integral part of the marine biosphere. They undergird the valuable resources human beings extract from the ocean—resources we’ve come to depend on.…

Posted in mission blue |

Leave a comment