The South Korean city of Busan hosts the tenth Our Ocean Conference.
Seoul, April 28 (EFEverde).- The port city of Busan, in southeastern South Korea, is hosting the Our Ocean 2025 Conference from Monday to Wednesday, April 30, where topics such as marine protected areas, sustainable fishing, ocean pollution, maritime security, and digital oceans will be discussed.
The tenth edition of the Our Ocean Conference (OOC), under the theme "Our Ocean, Our Action," will serve as a platform for discussion on the sustainable future of the oceans.
This global meeting will be attended by ministerial representatives from 100 different countries and leaders from various international institutions and non-governmental organizations.
The conference will serve as an impetus for participants to announce effective actions to accelerate the achievement of the goal of protecting 30% of the world's oceans by 2030, with the help of digital ocean technology and international cooperation.
InnovationThe event will also serve as a platform for sharing actions that will create an innovative framework for the "blue economy," a model that seeks to promote the economic, social, and environmental development of coastal and maritime regions through the sustainable management of marine resources.
The COO will also focus on analyzing proposals to reduce and absorb ocean carbon to address climate change, as well as exploring ways to promote actions to end illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing.
The discussions will place special emphasis on the need to unify the efforts of governments, authorities, businesses, and citizens to address marine debris, especially plastic pollution.
Around 80% of global trade is carried out by sea, so maritime security will also be at the center of discussions given the current context marked by armed conflicts and illegal activities such as piracy, which cause significant economic disruption and must be addressed jointly.
In addition, actions will be explored to boost ocean sustainability through digital technology, which can improve logistical efficiency and digital management of maritime traffic, or reduce greenhouse gas emissions from ships.
Host proposalSouth Korea, as the host country, plans to propose the "Korea Blue Action Plan," which includes 70 commitments to promote ocean sustainability.
"Our oceans are facing a crisis, as the marine ecosystem is threatened by rising temperatures caused by climate change, marine debris, and overexploitation of marine resources," said South Korean Oceans Minister Kang Do-hyung at a press conference last week in conjunction with this conference.
The Our Ocean Conference is an initiative launched by the United States Department of State in 2014, and since then annual meetings have been held, the last two in Panama (2022) and Athens (2023), which ended with 469 new commitments and funds reaching 11.35 billion euros to strengthen the blue economy.
The United Nations has designated the Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030), or Ocean Decade, in support of the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 14 of the 2030 Agenda, which calls for the conservation and sustainable use of the oceans. EFEverde
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