As one of the world’s prominent maritime nations, Indonesia has taken the initiative to hold a major conference on climate change and the potential of the planet’s ocean to combat the negative impacts of climate change securing the role of oceans as a source of food and the future coastal communities, reports Pieter Tesch.
The World Ocean Conference (WOC2009) to be held in Manado, North Sulawesi, 11-15 May expects to bring together hundreds of representatives of maritime industries, heads of government, senior officials, scientists and representatives of international agencies and non-government organisations.
Indonesia took the initiative because it felt that in the debate on the negative impacts of climate change the potential role of the oceans to act as, for instance, ‘carbon sinks’ was neglected, said WOC2009 executive secretary Noldy Tuerah.
He also stressed that it was high time after more than 25 years to upgrade the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which forms the current international legal basis for the world’s maritime activities such as the Economic Exclusive Zones (EEZ).
The question and the task was how to strike the right balance between sustainable economy and ecology at a global level between nations and the industries that use the oceans, such as fishing, as well as for safeguarding the rights of often vulnerable coastal communities, especially in the developing world, said Mr Tuerah.
He added that WOC2009’s aim was the adoption of the ‘Manado Ocean Declaration’, to upgrade UNCLOS and the signing of the Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI) to protect to coral reefs, fisheries and food security in the Asia Pacific region that produce a source of food for 120 million people, a place for tuna spawning and the regional source of income with an estimate value of U$2.3 billion per year.
