14 Apr 2026

Photo by Nik Shuliahin The third and final preparatory commission for the High Seas Treaty concluded on 2 April at the United Nations headquarters in New York, wrapping up two weeks of intensive negotiations that the High Seas Alliance described as delivering meaningful progress, but also leaving several significant issues unresolved ahead of the treaty’s first Conference […]

26 Mar 2026

Image description: Village women are in a queue to collect drinking water as they travel long distances to collect drinking water, Satkhira, Bangladesh. The southwestern coastal region of Bangladesh has faced thirty large-and moderate-scale natural disasters in the last two decades. Image credit: Abir Abdullah / Climate Visuals    Women and girls continue to be disproportionately impacted by […]

26 Mar 2026

Image description: Salmon jumping upstream. Image by Danny Moore from Pixabay.    Migratory freshwater fish populations vital to river health and sustaining the livelihoods of millions of people are in freefall and risk collapse, a major UN assessment has warned.  Freshwater fish face multiple threats and are “among the most imperiled vertebrates”, according to the most comprehensive assessment to […]

22 Jan 2026

The world has entered an era of “global water bankruptcy” that is already harming billions of people, according to a landmark United Nations report. The study, published by the UN University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (UNU-INWEH), warns that many societies have long been using water faster than it can be naturally replenished. As […]

30 Dec 2025

  As 2025 draws to a close, and while the physical state of the world’s oceans remains under intense pressure from climate change, the past 12 months have seen some fundamental shifts in how nations could manage the high seas and coastal waters in the future. The most significant legal milestone occurred as the Global […]

01 Jul 2025

Image description: A blue sea star (Linckia laevigata) photographed on a largely dead reef on the Coral Coast on Fiji’s largest island, Viti Levu. The damage to the reef is likely caused by a number of stressors, including prolonged water temperatures, storm surges and fertiliser input from agriculture on land, as well as overfishing of […]

17 Jun 2025

Photo of beach in Nice, France, by Amira El Fohail   At the third UN Ocean Conference (UNOC) in Nice, held from 9th – 13th June 2025 and co‑hosted by France and Costa Rica, governments, heads of state and more than 10,000 delegates, including 60 world leaders, gathered to confront an ocean in crisis. Against […]

17 Jun 2025

Photo of Istanbul by Evgeny Matveev   A new regional initiative, the “Blueing the Black Sea” Project (BBSEA), was officially launched in Istanbul on June 10, 2025. The project aims to address significant environmental challenges facing the Black Sea, including untreated wastewater, agricultural runoff, marine litter, and industrial discharge. These issues have contributed to the […]