Governing Open Ocean and Fish Carbon: Perspectives and Opportunities

Abstract

Marine life plays a vital role in the ocean’s biological pump by sequestering and mediating fluxes of carbon to the deep sea and sea floor. The roles that fish and other marine vertebrates play in the biological pump are increasingly attracting scientific and policy attention. In this paper, we investigated the interest in and possibilities for the international governance of open ocean and fish carbon ecosystem services. We used semi-structured interviews with representatives from environmental non-governmental organisations (ENGOs), policy makers, and policy experts, along with an exploratory review of grey and peer-reviewed literature to: 1) trace the pathway of important milestones, key actors, and their strategies to influence governance of ocean carbon, and, 2) investigate which frameworks might be used to govern open ocean and fish carbon. Strategies of key actors to direct attention to open ocean and fish carbon included collaborating with scientists, organising side events at climate and biodiversity negotiations and seminars to engage policy makers, as well as educational campaigns directed to the public and policy makers about the co-benefits of open ocean and fish carbon. While we found a strong focus of ENGO activities related to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, we also found strong opposition against active governance of open ocean and fish carbon by key Intergovernmental actors in this forum. Opposition stems from a lack of scientific information on how long open ocean and fish carbon is stored, difficulties in attributing carbon flows with individual countries mitigation actions, and fewer perceived co-benefits (e.g. coastal protection in the case of coastal blue carbon) for coastal communities. More viable routes for the future governance of open ocean and fish carbon may lie in international fisheries management and in current negotiations of a treaty for biodiversity conservation in the high seas.

Protecting ocean carbon through biodiversity and climate governance

“…Other agreements with implications for EIA, SEA and area-based management , such as the CBD (within national jurisdictions) and ISA (the seabed in international waters), could likewise address the protection of ocean carbon. The UNFCCC scored low on biodiversity and ocean carbon factors factors, which, in addition to ocean carbon traceability concerns (Oostdijk et al, 2022), make the UNFCCC seem like an unlikely platform for the explicit management of ocean carbon ecosystem services.…”

“…Stakeholder consultation can enhance conservation outcomes because of the broader consideration of ecosystem services (Solomonsz et al, 2021). Participation from interest groups has previously helped to promote ocean carbon and nature based solutions in biodiversity and climate policy discussions (Oostdijk et al, 2022). To further support discussions of ocean carbon in upcoming negotiations (e.g.…”

“…There are concerns that valuable ocean carbon transport and sequestration may be lost without specific regulations in place (Oostdijk et al, 2022). Ocean carbon, a component of blue carbon, refers to all biologically-driven carbon fluxes and storage in marine systems amenable to management in the open ocean (Pörtner et al, 2019).…”

“…Policies that foster integrative modes of thinking can more easily be used to address multiple issues than siloed policies (Rayner and Howlett, 2009). For example, ocean carbon policy development may be more relevant to agreements that jointly integrate biodiversity and climate issues (Oostdijk et al, 2022). In addition, agreements that already cover important ocean carbon components such as nutrient cycling and species related to the biological carbon pump would allow policymakers to expand existing policy instruments rather than concern themselves with costly and time-consuming new negotiations (Tiller et al, 2019).…”

Science governs the future of the mesopelagic zone

“…For example, although some recent publications have begun to consider the economic viability of shing in the mesopelagic zone 26,27 , there are no keywords in the topic model that indicate scienti c evaluation of the costs and bene ts of exploitation (in social, economic or ecological terms). Similarly, some have considered what new institutional arrangements may be required for the mesopelagic zone 4 and the high seas 28,29 , and have called for particular modes of governance in both scienti c journals 30 and public-facing threads on Twitter 31 . Despite this, however, keywords indicating political and social research are largely absent from the topic model.…”