The UN ratifies the Treaty on the High Seas, now the concrete actions of individual countries are needed

After the fundamental agreement in March, yesterday the UN put the definitive seal on the treaty to protect the high seas and preserve marine biodiversity in international waters. After 20 years of negotiations, last March the over 100 countries have approved a text also known as the “Treaty on biodiversity beyond national jurisdictions”a regulatory framework to conserve and curb harmful activities in two-thirds of the oceans, in international waters.

The Treaty established that there are no areas in the oceans that are not subject to any effective regulation: is now actually being subjected to control a marine surface of 240 million square kilometers, 64% of the oceans and almost 50% of the surface of the entire planet.

One of the most ambitious objectives of the Treaty for the protection of the High Seas, as mentioned, is protect 30% of the oceans by 2030, through the creation of a network of Marine Protected Areas: currently, in fact, only 1.2% of the oceans are under total protection.
The second central point of the treaty is regulate the exploitation of resources. The advance of technology and innovative instruments have in fact made the High Seas increasingly accessible and, consequently, have made activities such as theextraction of minerals or food resources (fishing and harvesting of plants and algae especially for the pharmacological industry).

As he was able to point out Robert DanovaroDirector of the Department of Life and Environmental Sciences at the Polytechnic University of Marche and one of the world’s leading experts on the oceans, “the treaty establishes a fundamental principle to regulate the exploitation of the coveted and precious resources present in international waters: every extraction project must be subject to a prior environmental impact assessment. The rich deposits of precious metals such as nickel, manganese, lithium and cobalt, of rare earths and critical raw materials, many of which are indispensable for digital technologies, for the latest generation batteries or for the production of renewable energy will no longer be taken from the depths of the high seas without any supervision”.

The salient points of the Treaty for the protection of the High Seas

• the protection of 30% of the oceans;
• the sharing of marine genetic resources;
• more stringent criteria for carrying out any human activity in these ecosystems;
• the establishment of an ad hoc conference of the parties, which will meet regularly to verify the implementation of the treaty by the acceding states;
• the production of more complete environmental assessments before proceeding with human activities capable of interfering with marine ecosystems

Ratification of the treaty must now follow concrete actions in the individual member countries. Indeed, before the agreement enters into force must be formally adopted and will have to be legally approved and signed by the different States. A bit like what happens in Italy when a law is approved, in short, “implementing decrees” will have to be drawn up by each individual country. As many experts have pointed out it is therefore an historic first step, but each signatory will have to do his part as soon as possible.