Sweden has become the latest nation to join the UK’s Global Ocean Alliance to help drive urgent action to safeguard the ocean and protect its precious wildlife.
Increasing sea temperatures, deoxygenation, acidification, habitat loss, overfishing and pollution are all damaging the world’s marine environments, threatening marine life and habitats. The UK-led international coalition aims to tackle these impacts and safeguard at least 30 percent of the global ocean in Marine Protected Areas by 2030.
The newest member of the Alliance was officially welcomed by the International Environment Minister, Zac Goldsmith, during a keynote speech at WWF’s ‘Blue Road to Glasgow’ ocean conference. Speaking at the event ahead of COP26 in Glasgow later this year, Minister Goldsmith set out the UK’s ambition to make our ocean more resilient through this global alliance and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that can contribute to warming ocean temperatures.
In the 2020 Year of Climate Action, the UK is taking a world-leading approach to marine conservation. As well as being the first country to commit to net-zero emissions by 2050, the UK led the call for a global 30 percent ocean protection target at the 2018 United Nations General Assembly – and countries from Belize to Belgium are backing the initiative, as part of nature-based solutions to improve ocean resilience.
The UK is at the forefront of marine protection with 357 Marine Protected Areas. Last year the government designated 41 new Marine Conservation Zones (MCZs), spanning almost 12,000 square kilometres – an area almost eight times the size of Greater London – for a total of 91 MCZs. This means that 40% of English waters are designated as marine protection areas – setting an example for the rest of the world to follow.
This year, the UK Government will invite all countries to sign up to this ambition, with the aim that 30by30 marine protection target will be agreed as part of a new global biodiversity framework at the Convention on Biological Diversity Conference of Parties in October 2020. This would go far further than the current target set at 10%.
Original source: DFID
Published on 19 February 2020
