Activists protest during the COP16 Summit, in Cali, Colombia, on Oct. 28, 2024. The summit was suspended before approval on the morning of Nov. 2 and will resume on a later date complete the agenda towards achieving 23 targets agreed in Canada two years ago to halt and reverse nature destruction by 2030.LUIS ACOSTA/AFP/Getty Images
As the COP16 biodiversity conference comes to a close, Canada and other countries are stressing the urgent need to ratify a legally binding treaty for high seas marine protected areas, aiming for enforcement by 2025.
“In Canada, being bordered by three oceans, we know and understand the importance of ocean protection,” said Environment and Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault in a phone interview, adding that Canada’s commitment is visible in the government’s achievements since 2015.
“Canada wasn’t even protecting 1 per cent of its oceans and coastline, and now we’re close to 16 per cent,” he said. “Chances are, by the end of the year, we could be closer to 17 or 18 per cent, so we’re showing that it can be done.”
While commendable, that still falls short of the “30x30″ commitment to conserve 30 per cent of land and ocean habitats by 2030, the target adopted under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) at COP15 in Montreal within the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).
With six years remaining, reaching that goal is possible. But a new report, On track or off course? – Assessing progress toward the 30x30 target for the ocean, found that only 14 of the 196 parties to the CBD have protected more than 30 per cent of their country’s waters.
Only about 1 per cent of the high seas – outside national waters – is effectively protected, the report says. That figure is projected to rise to just 9.7 per cent by 2030, as progress has been slow since the adoption of the GBF in 2022.
The High Seas Treaty, formally known as the agreement on Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction, was finalized at an intergovernmental conference at the United Nations in March last year. Ratifying it will close a major gap in high seas governance and create a legal framework for protecting waters and assessing environmental impacts beyond national jurisdictions.
The oceans face numerous threats – from overfishing and illegal fishing to habitat destruction, plastic and noise pollution, climate change and emerging industries such as deep-sea mining for minerals and collecting marine genetic information for biotechnology, medicine and cosmetics.
With 105 countries, including Canada, having signed the treaty, ratification is the next crucial step.
“The pressure at COP16 for countries to ratify the High Seas Treaty is significant because we cannot reach 30x30 without 50 per cent of the planet. Our challenge is going to be whether we can stay the course on that promise,” said Susanna Fuller, vice-president of Oceans North, at COP16. Next week, the Canadian marine conservation charity will host a gathering in Ottawa to celebrate Canada’s progress toward ratifying the treaty.
Rebecca Hubbard, the director of the High Seas Alliance, welcomes that step. The treaty can only enter into force 120 days after ratification by 60 countries. Fourteen have followed through, including at least one from every continent – except North America.
“Canada, the U.S. and Mexico have signed the treaty, and I know that Canada is working on ratifying, so we hope very much to see that ratification before June,” Ms. Hubbard said.
For ratification, the federal cabinet must first approve it, then introduce new legislation for it to take effect. The goal is to secure the necessary ratifications by the UN Ocean Conference in June, 2025, two years after the treaty’s formal adoption.
With fewer than 220 days left, will 46 countries, including Canada, succeed in the race to ratification?
“I’m doing as much as I can from abroad. The situation in the House is a bit crazy,” Mr. Guilbeault said, referring to his absence from COP16. As a key architect of the GBF, he believes the formula used in Montreal was partly responsible for the treaty’s adoption.
Now, as part of the “first movers” group led by Chile and supported by the U.S. and other countries, Canada is hoping to fast-track the first wave of eight marine protected areas (MPAs) in the high seas as soon as the new treaty becomes law.
Canada’s leadership was evident in the first major agreement at COP16 to conserve marine areas in international waters too. The agreement supports Indigenous and local communities working with scientists to identify and define ecologically and biologically significant areas in the high seas. The EBSA process, said the CBD secretariat’s Joseph Appiott via e-mail, was largely inspired by a process undertaken by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada.
Andreas Hansen, the global ocean policy director at the Nature Conservancy, says EBSAs are important for describing the ocean. “By knowing the ocean, decision-makers can then make good, balanced decisions about where protections and sustainable-use measures like fisheries management are placed.”
Enacting the treaty will unify the various regulatory bodies overseeing high seas protections, from deep-seabed mining under the International Seabed Authority to fish stock conservation by regional fisheries management organizations and species protections under the Convention on Migratory Species.
The treaty is especially important to developing, coastal and small-island countries hoping to safeguard the equitable sharing of digital sequence information (DSI) benefits. “The treaty balances the playground for access to marine genetic resources and sharing the benefits more equitably amongst global citizens,” Ms. Hubbard said.
Both the treaty and the CBD advocate for a global fund to support DSI use benefit-sharing. With potential earnings estimated in the trillions of dollars, developing countries are seeking a fair share to reinvest in conservation. Wealthy countries, especially those with pharmaceutical and cosmetic industries, are debating whether the fund should be voluntary or mandatory.
Brian O’Donnell, the director of the Campaign for Nature, cautions that reliance on voluntary contributions is problematic. “Safeguarding the world’s biodiversity, and all of our lives, on the goodwill of corporations whose mission is to make a profit, not to save nature, is a dangerous proposition.”
At COP16, the philanthropic sector pledged US$51.7-million, the largest private commitment to high seas conservation aimed at developing marine-protected areas. While Mr. O’Donnell applauds that contribution, he emphasizes that governments must take the lead. “Governments currently pay for 85 per cent of biodiversity conservation, so the idea that the philanthropic sector or corporate sector is somehow going to replace that is unlikely.”
High seas are vital for migratory species such as sea birds and whales, which face increasing threats along their routes and in critical habitats.
“We have no economies and no planet and no human health without biodiversity,” said Sue Lieberman, vice-president of the Wildlife Conservation Society. “That’s why the treaty is so important, because it establishes mechanisms to declare protected areas on the high seas.”
This story was produced in partnership with the Pulitzer Center’s Ocean Reporting Network.