The World Economic Forum and the the Marine Science Institute of University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), have announced a partnership to improve the health of the world’s oceans and maritime resources.
The new partnership aims to protect world’s $2.5-trillion ocean economy.
This partnership will harness the potential of public-private cooperation and the fourth industrial revolution to help the international community meet the ocean sustainable development goal.
It will be supported by the Benioff Ocean Initiative, an applied programme within UCSB’s Marine Science Institute, using science to improve ocean health, and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, a fund to advance ocean science, protection and management.
Through this new partnership with the World Economic Forum, scientists at UC Santa Barbara who are setting the global agenda for ocean research will also now play a role in setting the global agenda for ocean change.
According to the World Wildlife Fund, oceans generate goods and services worth an estimated $2.5 trillion per year, equivalent to the seventh largest economy in the world.
However, this value — in addition to the livelihoods of 80 per cent of the world’s population — is threatened by the decline in ocean health.