FIFTH MEETING OF UN OPEN-ENDED INFORMAL CONSULTATIVE PROCESS ON OCEANS AND LAW OF SEA TO TAKE PLACE AT HEADQUARTERS, 7 - 11 JUNE

Background Release                                         

Fifth Meeting of un Open-ended Informal Consultative Process on Oceans

and Law of Sea to take place at Headquarters, 7 - 11 June

To Focus on New Sustainable Uses of Oceans, Including Conservation,

Management of Seabed Biological Diversity in Areas beyond National Jurisdiction

NEW YORK, 4 June (UN Office of Legal Affairs) -- The fifth meeting of the United Nations Open-ended Informal Consultative Process on Oceans and the Law of the Sea will take place at United Nations Headquarters from 7 to 11 June.  At this meeting, the Consultative Process will focus on “new sustainable uses of the oceans, including the conservation and management of the biological diversity of the seabed in areas beyond national jurisdiction”.

An international workshop on a regular process for global reporting and assessment of the state of the marine environment, including socio-economic aspects, is being convened in conjunction with the fifth meeting of the Consultative Process.  The workshop is a step towards the implementation of the recommendations of the World Summit on Sustainable Development and the request of the General Assembly for the establishment by 2004 of a regular process under the United Nations for global reporting and assessment of the state of the marine environment.

The Informal Consultative Process was established by the General Assembly in 1999 (resolution 54/33) to facilitate its annual review of developments in oceans and the law of the sea.  The Process was reviewed at the Assembly’s fifty-seventh session, where it was noted that it had contributed to strengthening the Assembly’s annual debate on oceans and the law of the sea.  By resolution 57/141 of 12 December 2002, the General Assembly decided to continue the Consultative Process for an additional three years.

At this meeting, the Consultative Process will base its discussions on the report of the Secretary-General on oceans and the law of the sea (document A/59/62).  In addition to matters related to the new sustainable uses of the oceans, the report contains information on declarations and statements made by States under articles 287, 298 and 310 of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and under article 47 of the United Nations Fish Stocks Agreement.  In commemoration of the tenth anniversary of the entry into force of the Convention, the report provides a review of State practice with regard to maritime space and elaborates on developments in the institutions created by the Convention.  It further provides information on capacity-building, recent developments relating to the safety and security of navigation, the protection of the marine environment and the conservation and management of marine living resources.  It addresses the establishment of a mechanism for inter-agency coordination and cooperation for matters relating to oceans and seas within the United Nations system.  The report identifies two main challenges for the future:  to ensure that States parties fully implement the provisions of the Convention and that inter-agency cooperation is facilitated and enhanced.

On the basis of consultations with delegations and of an informal preparatory meeting held at Headquarters on 12 March 2004, the co-chairpersons of the Consultative Process, Ambassador Felipe H. Paolillo (Uruguay) and Philip D. Burgess (Australia), have proposed a format and annotated provisional agenda for the meeting (document A/AC.259/L.5).

At this meeting, the Consultative Process will also have before it the report of the Consultative Group on Flag State Implementation (document A/59/63), an inter-agency task force comprising International Maritime Organization (IMO), International Labour Organization (ILO), Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the United Nations which met in May 2003.  The report which was requested by the Consultative Process last year also responds to the request by the General Assembly in resolution 58/240 for a comprehensive elaboration of the duties and obligations of flag States.

The IMO secretariat has also submitted a paper on the subject of flag State implementation, which outlines the Organization’s mandate and work undertaken with respect to strengthening flag State jurisdiction (document A/AC.259/11).

The delegation of Australia has submitted for circulation a document containing the summary of the discussions and suggestions made at a Workshop on the Governance of High Seas Biodiversity Conservation, held at Cairns, Australia, 16 to 19 June 2003 (document A/AC.259/12).  The Workshop was convened to explore governance and legal arrangements for conservation and management of biological diversity in high seas areas.

New Sustainable Uses of Oceans in Areas beyond National Jurisdiction

At this meeting, participants in the Consultative Process will discuss emerging issues in relation to the new sustainable uses of the oceans.  New uses highlighted by the Secretary-General’s report include offshore energy sources, such as wind, wave and tidal power, as well as ocean thermal energy conversion, and the potential exploitation of new minerals and gas hydrates.

Offshore wind energy is perhaps the fastest growing of these new energy sources.  Several offshore wind power plants are planned in the future in order to meet ambitious renewable energy targets set by governments.  With respect to wave and tidal power, it is estimated that waves form a potentially worldwide energy resource of around two terawatts, while the total world potential for ocean tidal power has been estimated at 64,000 megawatts.  Ocean thermal energy conversion systems not only produce electricity, but also desalinate water.  However, currently these thermal energy systems are not cost-effective as compared to conventional energy-production methods.

New minerals that have been discovered in depths up to 4,000 metres are polymetallic sulphides and cobalt-rich ferromanganese crusts.  Polymetallic sulphides contain metals such as copper, zinc, lead, gold and silver and occur in hydrothermal vents.  Cobalt-rich ferromanganese crusts occur on outer-rim terraces and on the summits of seamounts and cover about 1.7 per cent of the ocean floor.  The crusts are estimated to contain a billion tons of cobalt, as well as other minerals.  Another new resource that has been discovered are methane or gas hydrates, a naturally occurring “ice-like” combination of natural gas and water, which tend to underlie permafrost or continental margin sediments.  It is estimated that the volume of energy trapped in methane hydrates exceeds the volume of all known conventional gas resources.  Although interest in methane hydrates is high, there are difficulties with extracting this resource.  Also the implications of the vast methane reservoir for the global carbon cycle, long-term climate, seafloor stability and future energy policy need to be carefully examined.

The Consultative Process will also address the conservation and management of the biological diversity of the seabed in areas beyond national jurisdiction.  The report of the Secretary-General notes that while until recently the deep sea was likened to a desert in terms of species diversity, currently it is estimated that the deep seabed beyond national jurisdiction may be home to 10 million species of organisms.  Discoveries of biodiversity hot spots in the deep oceans include seamounts, cold and deep water corals and deep sea benthic ecosystems which rely on energy sources other than light, such as hydrothermal vents.  These vents can be described as underwater hot springs.

Seamounts and cold-water coral reefs are used by many marine fish species as habitats and spawning grounds, but are under increasing pressure from deep-sea fishing activities, which has intensified as a consequence of the overexploitation of traditional fishing grounds in marine and coastal areas.  Advances in fishing gear technologies enable deep-sea fisheries to operate at depths greater than 400 metre, sometimes at 1,500-2,000 metres, and target long-lived and slow-growing fish species, such as orange roughy, grenadier or alfonsino, the life cycles of which are still largely unknown to ichthyologists and other scientists.  Deep-sea fishing is conducted with the help of bottom trawling nets, which scrape the seabed floor, including vulnerable ecosystems such as corals and other underwater features, and catches in addition to the target species, by-catch of juvenile fish and other non-target species that are subsequently discarded.

The biological characteristics of deep-sea species, the fragility of the habitats where they dwell, the poor track record of the fishing industry in marine fisheries conservation, and particularly the fact that deep-sea fishing activities are largely unregulated, have raised concerns over the sustainability of deep-sea fisheries operations.

Apart from deep-sea fish species, the marine biodiversity of deep-sea benthic ecosystems is also a vast reserve of other economically, scientifically and environmentally valuable compounds, materials and organisms.  For example, marine genetic resources, such as bacteria, that live in some of the extreme environments of the deep seabed may have a number of commercial uses, ranging from pharmaceuticals and cosmetics to waste treatment, molecular biology, and food and agricultural processes.  Increasing scientific and commercial interest in these resources has resulted in more human pressures on the ecosystems they inhabit.  The communities surrounding deep-sea benthic ecosystems, in particular hydrothermal vent ecosystems, are exposed to the effects of scientific research and related bioprospecting activities.  Deep seabed mining, when it starts, is also expected to have an impact on the ecosystems.

In his report, the Secretary-General presents the legal and institutional framework for the conservation and management of biodiversity of the seabed beyond national jurisdiction.  With regard to the marine genetic resources on the seabed beyond national jurisdiction, a lacuna has been identified with respect to the regulation of bioprospecting activities.

Some of the issues that may be addressed by participants during the fifth meeting, include the state of knowledge of the biodiversity of the seabed beyond areas of national jurisdiction and whether there are further steps that need to be taken to collect and share this information; what further international cooperation and coordination is required in relation to marine scientific research and related activities in areas beyond national jurisdiction, including the biodiversity of the seabed; whether the existing international regime sufficiently addressesthe conservation and management of biological diversity of the seabed in areas beyond national jurisdiction; and whether there are any new or additional forms of international cooperation or coordination required for the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources on the seabed in areas beyond national jurisdiction.

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