At the 2025 United Nations Ocean Conference (UNOC3), the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) recognized three countries and regions for their large-scale programs to restore their native ecosystems.
As the curtains draw on the UN Ocean Conference, a flurry of voluntary commitments and political declarations has injected fresh impetus into global efforts to conserve marine biodiversity. With the world’s oceans facing unprecedented threats, high-level biodiversity officials and negotiators are sounding the alarm and calling for renewed momentum—and funding—to deliver on long-standing promises.
The 2025 UN Ocean Conference (UNOC3) has seen a significant presence from Indigenous peoples, who insist that their perspective and guidance be taken into account in the global efforts for sustainable ocean use and conservation. The sense of responsibility to the ocean and recognition of its history is an example that the international community can learn from.
Once cast as a culprit of ocean degradation, the global shipping industry is quietly reshaping its image—with experts now betting on it as a key ally in saving our seas.
Prime Minister of Tuvalu, Feleti Teo, describes himself as an optimist—despite the existential crisis his atoll nation faces with climate change-induced sea level rise and frustration with existing international financial mechanisms to fund adaptation and mitigation.
Just before dawn, the worn wooden dhows begin gliding toward the shore at Magogoni fish market in Tanzania’s port city of Dar es Salaam. Their tattered sails flutter against the orange sky. Exhausted fishers step out onto the muddy sand, hauling frayed nets and plastic crates, their sun-creased faces tight with fatigue.
As the sun peeked through the French Riviera clouds and a dozen reporters sipped orange juice aboard the WWF Panda Boat docked at Port Lympia, Frankie Orona, a Native American rights advocate from the Society of Native Nations in San Antonio, Texas, stunned the room into a moment of absolute stillness.
To the outside world, a sea level rise of 34 cm (or slightly longer than a child’s ruler) may not seem dramatic, but it’s an existential threat to the Pacific island state of Vanuatu.
Each year, more than 12.5 million tonnes of plastic are used in agriculture alone, and another 37 million tonnes become food packaging. Very little gets recycled.
Under the surface of Tanzania’s turquoise waters, a miracle unfolds quietly every day.
“There is no climate action without ocean action,” President Hilda Heine of the Marshall Islands told reporters, as she and other representatives of Pacific island states reiterated that countries must honor their climate action agreements.
While the island states in the Pacific may be modest, the ocean that surrounds them represents a huge oceanic state—an area equivalent to the entire European Continent.
A groundbreaking initiative to revolutionize global ocean observation is being launched this week at the UN Ocean Conference side event, aiming to enlist 10,000 commercial ships to collect and transmit vital ocean and weather data by 2035.
The late afternoon sun sparkles on the waters of the French Riviera as yachts dock at the Port of Nice with mechanical grace. A tram glides past palm-lined boulevards, where joggers, drenched in sweat, huff past leisurely strollers and sunbathers. Just beside the promenade, a crowd gathers around a young girl. With braided hair bouncing in rhythm, she belts out Beyoncé’s Halo with stunning precision. Her bare feet dance on the cobblestones, her voice echoing against the pastel façades.
“When we poison the ocean, we poison ourselves,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres told reporters on the second day of the UN Ocean Conference (UNOC3).
Year by year researchers improve and deepen our understanding of economic activity. The primary example, and probably the most commonly used, is the detailed data and analysis available on gross domestic product (GDP).
The world has converged along the Mediterranean Sea to affirm their commitments to the sustainable use and protection of the ocean.
A newly released report by Earth Insight in collaboration with 16 environmental organizations has sounded a global alarm on the unchecked expansion of offshore oil and gas projects into some of the most biologically rich and ecologically sensitive marine environments on the planet.
As the UN Ocean Conference (UNOC) approaches, bringing renewed attention to SDG 14 (Life Below Water) and the rights of ocean-dependent communities, India’s Vizhinjam coast highlights the environmental injustice and human cost of unchecked coastal development.
Char Tito is hammering nails into wood at Kakuma Arid Zone Secondary School in Turkana County, northern Kenya. The 16-year-old is making a traditional chair under the scorching sun outside one of the classroom blocks.
The ocean is far more than a vast expanse of water; it is a cornerstone of life and a critical driver of sustainable development. The intricate relationship between human development and the ocean underscores why ocean governance and sustainability are pivotal to global progress. Its significance becomes particularly evident in Small Island Developing States (SIDS), where the ocean is not just a resource but an intrinsic part of identity and survival.