The Pew Environment Group recommendations include using the precautionary principle and ecosystem approach as guiding principles in the UNCSD, and overhauling international environmental governance in the area of marine environment.
6 January 2011: The Pew Environment Group has issued a briefing and recommendations to the First Intersessional Meeting of the UNCSD (Rio+20), taking place from 10-11 January 2011. The document is titled “Bringing the Ocean Back into the Earth Summit.”
The briefing includes sections on: state of the ocean; background and historical underpinnings; living up to the Rio Declaration; the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD), including Marine-related Goals and Targets ; the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), including MDG Targets relevant to ocean conservation; the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), including targets from the 10th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP 10); and institutional reforms for ocean governance. Asserting that the ocean is the “life support system of Planet Earth” the report calls for the UNCSD to “pay due attention to the needs of the ocean,” and to its hundreds of millions of human dependents. It offers recommendations on the two themes of the UNCSD.
On green economy, it calls for the UNCSD to use the precautionary principle and ecosystem approach as guiding principles. Pew makes recommendations on: increasing Marine Protected Areas (MPAs); addressing illegal, unregulated and unreported (IUU) fishing; minimizing anthropogenic impacts on the ocean; implementing management measures in the Arctic Ocean; monitoring, control, surveillance, compliance and enforcement (MCSCE); mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions to lessen the impacts of climate change and ocean acidification on the ocean; and resilience and adaptation.
On the institutional framework for sustainable development, the report notes that 2012 will be the 30-year anniversary of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and calls for an overhaul in international environmental governance, particularly where it pertains to the marine environment. To strengthen the institutional framework, Pew makes recommendations on: reforming international environmental governance mechanisms, including under UNCLOS; reforming regional ocean governance to implement and enforce green economy reforms; and ensuring transparency and accountability within all Regional Fisheries Management Organizations and Agreements (RFMO/As), the International Whaling Commission (IWC), and others.
The Pew Environment Group is the conservation arm of the Pew Charitable Trusts, a non-governmental organization. [Bringing the Ocean Back into the Earth Summit]
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