United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres said on Monday the world could not let the deepest oceans “become the wild west”, at the start in France of a global summit on the seas.World leaders are attending the UN Ocean Conference in Nice as nations tussle over contentious rules on mining the seabed for critical minerals and the terms of a global treaty on plastic pollution.US President Donald Trump has brought urgency to the debate around deep-sea mining, moving to fast-track US exploration in international waters and sidestepping global efforts to regulate the nascent sector.The International Seabed Authority, which has jurisdiction over the ocean floor outside national waters, is meeting in July to discuss a global mining code to regulate mining in the ocean depths.Guterres said he supported these negotiations and urged caution as countries navigate these “new waters on seabed mining”.“The deep sea cannot become the wild west,” he said, to applause from the plenary floor.Many countries oppose seabed mining, and France is hoping more nations in Nice will join a moratorium until more is known about the ecological impacts of the practice.French President Emmanuel Macron said a moratorium on deep-sea mining was “an international necessity”.“I think it’s madness to launch predatory economic action that will disrupt the deep seabed, disrupt biodiversity, destroy it and release irrecoverable carbon sinks — when we know nothing about it,” the French president said.The deep sea, Greenland and Antarctica were “not for sale”, he said in follow up remarks to thunderous applause.Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva called for “clear action” from the seabed authority to end a “predatory race” among nations seeking critical minerals on the ocean floor.“We now see the threat of unilateralism looming over the ocean. We cannot allow what happened to international trade to happen to the sea,” he said.
Wave of pledges
A global agreement to protect marine life in foreign waters, according to Macron, had received sufficient support to be law and was” a performed deal.” The great seas agreement signed in 2023 requires signatories from 60 signatories before it can be signed. France hoped to do this before Nice. According to Macron, about 50 countries had ratified the agreement, and 15 people had fully committed to signing it. This “gives us the assurance that the high seas agreement may be put into practice,” he said. On Monday in Nice, where about 60 heads of state and federal are expected to make additional agreements, there are a number of them scheduled to meet with thousands of business leaders, experts, and civic community activists. The UK is expected to reveal a partial ban on lower trawling in half of its marine protected areas on Monday, effectively putting the dangerous fishing approach on the summit’s agenda. The sea floor is a subject of startlingly detailed footage from a new film by British naturalist David Attenborough, which involves massive fishing nets arbitrarily dragging the ocean floor. Macron was criticized by setting groups for no going far enough when he announced on Saturday that France would restrict fishing in some of its marine protected areas.
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Agnes Pannier-Runacher, the French minister of culture, made a suggestion on Sunday about “important announcements” made during Nice regarding the creation of new marine protected areas. Samoa took the lead by announcing that 30 percent of its regional waters would be protected by the establishment of nine sea parks this past year. Despite a consensus goal to cover all waters by 2030, only 8 % of the world’s oceans are designated for sea protection. Actually fewer are regarded as genuinely protected, as some nations impose almost no restrictions on what is prohibited in coastal areas or lack the funds to implement any restrictions. Nations may be contacted to demand payment for sea safety, which is insufficient. At the mountain, small island states are expected to need financial and political support in order to combat rising sea levels, sea litter, and fish stock plunder. At the summit’s conclusion, the mountain won’t reach a legally binding agreement like a COP or negotiations of a treaty. However, if officials rose to the occasion, diplomats and other watchers said it might represent a much-needed turning point in world sea protection. We advise you to prove it if you are serious about protecting the sea, according to President Surangel Whipps Jr. of Palau, a low-lying Pacific region.
