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Ocean science is expanding and drawing more collaboration and funding, yet remains too poorly resourced to meet the challenges facing the sea. That is the assessment of the third Global Ocean Science Report, whose executive summary was released on 30 June at a session of UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission in Paris. The report describes itself as the most complete picture of global ocean science yet assembled.
What is improving
The report tracks the world’s capacity to study the ocean, the money invested in it, and the collaborations and research it produces. Several measures have moved in the right direction. Ocean science publications have doubled over 15 years, women now make up more than 40 per cent of the ocean science workforce, and more than 80 per cent of countries now produce research jointly with others, a form of collaboration the report calls vital for developing nations. Philanthropic funding has increased nearly threefold.
The report frames the case for investment in economic terms. It describes the ocean as an economic powerhouse rivalling the world’s largest national economies, and notes that the sea makes up 95 per cent of the planet’s biosphere.
What is still missing
Against those gains, the report sets stark inequalities. Just ten countries operate two-thirds of the world’s research vessels, leaving many nations dependent on others for access to the tools of ocean study. Only one in four of the actions under the UN Ocean Decade, the global research push running from 2021 to 2030, is fully funded. Access to technology is unequal, and funding overall falls short of what the report judges necessary.
With the Ocean Decade past its halfway point, the report sets out what it sees as the path to 2030: more skilled people, deeper international collaboration, and better tools for decision-making. All of that, it argues, depends on the ocean commanding a larger share of national and international budgets. The Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, which coordinates the Ocean Decade and brings together 153 member states, uses the report to guide governments as they decide what capacity a sustainable ocean will require.
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