World Bank Says Businesses Should Help Save Oceans

On October 16, 2013 the World Bank released a report urging businesses to take action to reverse damage to oceans that includes depleted fish stocks, ocean acidification, habitat destruction and ocean warming. The report was the product of the Blue Ribbon Panel of the Global Partnership for Oceans, a team of 21 experts from 16 countries which includes government ministers, environmental conservationists, academics and the CEOs of some of the world’s largest seafood companies. The report finds that piecemeal solutions that leave out social, economic, political, and ecological interactions will not be sufficient to solve the current decline of ocean health. Instead, the report recommends a global strategy utilizing public-private partnerships that leverage companies, local communities and governments to both protect and sustainably invest in the ocean. “Getting to healthy oceans is a global challenge that needs the concentrated effort of big and small business, government and science,” said panel chair Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, the director of the Global Change Institute at the University of Queensland in Australia. The study explains that the ocean has so far hidden the full impact of anthropogenic climate change by absorbing 25 percent of carbon dioxide released by human activities. “Ocean change is climate change and vice versa,” Hoegh-Guldberg remarked. “With looming threats of rising sea levels, warmer waters and a growing human population we need healthy oceans and coasts to mitigate climate change, feed billions and protect coastal communities.”

For additional information see: Environmental Leader, World Bank, Reuters