A Bold New Ocean Agenda: Recommendations for Ocean Governance, Energy Policy, and Health

• Date: 01 January 2009
• Author: Karen Hansen, Kathryn Mengerink, and Michael Sutton

39 ELR 10012 ENVIRONMENTAL LAW REPORT ER 1-200939 ELR 10012 ENVIRONMENTAL LAW REPORT ER 1-2009

A Bold New Ocean

Agenda:

Recommendations

for Ocean

Governance, Energy

Policy, and Health

by Karen Hansen, Kathryn Mengerink,

and Michael Sutton

Kathryn Mengerink is Director of the Ocean Program

at the Environmental Law Institute. Karen Hansen is a

principal with the law f‌irm, Beveridge & Diamond, P.C.

Michael Sutton directs the Center for the Future of the

Oceans at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, where he serves as

Vice President. The views presented are the authors’ own

and do not represent the views of their organizations.

Editors’ Summary:

The United States has more ocean area under its juris-

diction than any other country. The new Administration,

therefore, has every reason to place ocean concerns and

opportunities high on its environmental and economic

agendas. By reforming national ocean governance,

ensuring that changes in energy policy consider ocean

impacts, restoring U.S. leadership in marine research,

and launching a national ocean health initiative, the

new Administration will allow us to better safeguard

the marine environment as well as U.S. economic and

national security.

Oceans cover 71% of our planet. They inf‌luence our

climate and harbor enormous biodiversity. In address-

ing threats such as global warming, overexploitation of

resources, and extinction of species, the oceans will be a criti-

cal area of national focus and a platform for providing interna-

tional leadership.

While many Americans believe that oil spills constitute the

single greatest hazard to our oceans, in reality marine ecosys-

tems and resources face a variety of serious but often unseen

threats that include climate change, unsustainable and

destructive f‌ishing, various kinds of pollution, traditional and

emerging industrial and commercial activities, and coastal

development pressures. For example, scientists recently

warned that if present trends of overexploitation and loss of

biodiversity continue, commercial wild-capture f‌isheries may

be completely exhausted by 2048.1 On the climate front, high

levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are fundamentally

changing sea water chemistry, resulting in ocean acidif‌ication.

Ocean warming is directly impacting mar ine life and coastal

communities—from sea level rise and increased storm inten-

sity to habitat shifts and receding coastlines. Climate change

is also disrupting food chains for many marine organisms,

from f‌ish to seabirds to humans.2 Today more than 40% of the

world’s oceans are heavily a ffected by human activities and

few if any areas remain untouched, according to a global-scale

study of human inf‌luence on marine ecosystems.3

The United States has more ocean area under its jurisdic-

tion than any other country. Thus, the new Administration

has every reason to place ocean concerns and opportunities

high on its environmental and economic agendas. But opinion

research suggests that oceans are relatively low on the public’s

radar and, thus, the political playbill. The public largely fails

to recognize that the health of the human population is inextri-

cably linked to the well-being of our oceans. A healthy ocean

also provides for our economic needs; approximately 50% of

our g ross domestic product (GDP) is linked to coastal com-

munities and that ocean-dependent activities contribute more

than twice as much to our economy as our national agriculture

industry. Yet we neglect ocean health because these connec-

tions are largely unrecognized or underappreciated.

President-elect Barack Obama and the new Congress must

make oceans a higher national priority. We recommend four

major areas in need of attention to safeguard the marine envi-

ronment as well as U.S. economic and national security: (1)

reform national ocean governance; (2) ensure that changes in

1. In a study published in Science, an international group of ecologists and econo-

mists show that the loss of biodiversity is profoundly reducing the ocean’s ability

to produce seafood, resist diseases, f‌ilter pollutants, and rebound from stresses

such as overf‌ishing and climate change. See Boris Worm et al., Impacts of Biodi-

versity Loss on Ocean Ecosystem Services, 314 SCIENCE 787-90 (2006).

2. COMMUNICATION PARTNERSHIP FOR SCIENCE OF THE SEA, FACTS: CLIMATE CHANGE

AND THE OCEAN (2008).

3. Benjamin S. Halpern et al., A Global Map of Human Impact on Marine Ecosys-

tems, 319 SCIENCE 948-52 (2008).