The transnational nature of the ocean requires coherent cross-border policies and institutions. This chapter presents recommendations on the role of development co-operation in strengthening global coherence, particularly in light of the ocean’s transnational character. It provides guidance on supporting cross-border institutions that govern the ocean and offers considerations for integrating and harmonising the global ocean finance architecture. Finally, the chapter emphasises the importance of policy coherence for sustainable development—ensuring that providers’ other ocean-related policies complement, rather than undermine, their development co-operation efforts to support sustainable ocean economies.
Promoting Sustainable Ocean Economies
Guidance for Development Co-operation
Abstract
Development co-operation providers have a role in promoting global coherence in the ocean economy, both through their development assistance activities and through broader efforts on policy coherence for sustainable development. The former principally involves deploying capacity and financial resources to help partner countries engage in global arrangements, and to enable their implementation. The latter focuses on questions of transnational spillovers of domestic policies and supporting sound global institutions and systems.
The inherently transboundary nature of the ocean means that global co-ordination and coherence are critical for promoting a sustainable ocean economy. Nevertheless, existing global and regional governance mechanisms face significant challenges, as outlined in Section 1.5. Although new arrangements that address these challenges are emerging, many are not yet operational. One cross-cutting issue is that developing countries have not been sufficiently included in global ocean governance, undermining not only equity, but also cohesion. Simultaneously, the growing interest in financing the ocean, including as a global public good, risks fragmenting an already-fragmented international financial architecture.
The three recommendations in this chapter recognise that development co-operation providers have a role in promoting global coherence in the ocean economy, both through their development assistance activities and through broader efforts on policy coherence for sustainable development. The first recommendation focuses on how development co-operation providers can advance coherent international ocean governance (Section 6.1). The second suggests ways to minimise risks of fragmentation while accelerating efforts to finance the ocean as a global public good (Section 6.2). Finally, the third calls fostering policy coherence for sustainable development, in line with the OECD Recommendation of the Council on Policy Coherence for Sustainable Development (2019[1]).
Take steps towards implementing the BBNJ Agreement
Development co-operation providers can play an important role in supporting partner countries in concluding the BBNJ Agreement. Providers could help to fund an upfront implementation assistance mechanism to help countries with ratification, focusing on tailoring the Agreement’s principles to the local context. One example of this is Ireland’s support for the World Maritime University to operate a BBNJ Law Clinic dedicated to enabling SIDS and LDCs to ratify and implement the BBNJ Agreement. New Zealand and Australia fund the Office of the Pacific Ocean Commissioner to advocate in favour of Pacific perspectives in various global ocean forums and to support Pacific SIDS to ratify the BBNJ Agreement. This, together with coherent domestic policies on ratification, can accelerate the timeline for implementation of the BBNJ Agreement.
Once concluded, implementing the BBNJ Agreement will require capacity development and financial assistance. Article 52 outlines how the BBNJ Agreement will be resourced. It provides for the creation of a “mechanism for the provision of adequate, accessible, new and additional and predictable financial resources” (UN, 2023[2]). The mechanism will include a voluntary trust fund to facilitate the participation of developing countries, particularly those most in need, such as SIDS and LDCs; a special fund initially funded by annual assessed contributions from developed country parties; additional contributions on a voluntary basis; and the Global Environmental Facility (GEF) trust fund. It is also specified that GEF trust fund resources are to be used for activities such as capacity development; support for conservation programmes by Indigenous peoples and local communities as holders of traditional knowledge; public consultations and other activities.
Reinforce regional structures for marine conservation, restoration, and resource management
Development co-operation providers can provide direct support to cross-country approaches to marine conservation. These approaches, which typically occur at the regional level, can help account for the transboundary nature of natural marine assets. A positive example is the Coral Triangle Initiative, a partnership between the governments of Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Solomon Islands and Timor-Leste (Box 6.1). This initiative has received support from the GEF, Australia, the United States, the Asian Development Bank and other development co-operation providers.
Promoting the sustainable management of ocean resources which span EEZs is another area of action for development co-operation providers. Experience from the management of shared transboundary freshwater basins provides development co-operation with useful lessons for joint stewardship of the ocean. In circumstances where international watercourses are shared, states have been required to share sovereignty in a kind of “joint ownership” of the water body (Rieu-Clarke and Spray, 2013[3]). Examples include: the Senegal River Basin, shared by four countries and managed by the Senegal River Basin Organization; the Mekong River Basin, shared by six countries and managed by the Mekong River Commission; and the Danube River Basin, shared by nineteen countries and managed by International Commission on the Protection of the Danube River (Deribe et al., 2024[4]) . Providers can also draw inspiration from the principles of shared water management set up under the UN Watercourse Convention 1997 (UNWC). (Figueres, Manuel and Miliband, 2014[5]).
Development co-operation can also promote a co-ordinated response to the transboundary impact of climate change on ocean resources. For example, New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) is supporting the Pacific Community (SPC) to establish the Tuna Climate Intelligence System – an early warning system to forecast and monitor shifts in the economically critical Pacific tuna populations in response to climate change. The improved data collection and modelling used in the project will provide more detail on tuna distributions under different climate change scenarios, giving each country better forecasts of future tuna availability in their fisheries zones. The project has also established the foundations for the larger Green Climate Fund project, “Adapting tuna-dependent Pacific Island communities and economies to climate change”, developed by Conservation International and SPC.
The Coral Triangle is a vast marine region spanning six Southeast Asian developing countries: Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, the Solomon Islands, and Timor-Leste. It is home to extensive tropical nearshore coastal ecosystems (mangrove forests, seagrass beds, and coral reefs, which are some of the most diverse and productive ecosystems in the ocean. These ecosystems provide essential goods and services to a wide range of stakeholders, particularly low-income coastal communities, which are also among the most vulnerable to climate change.
To sustain marine and coastal resources while addressing food security, climate change, and marine biodiversity challenges, the six Coral Triangle nations established the Coral Triangle Initiative on Coral Reefs, Fisheries, and Food Security (CTI-CFF). The initiative adopted a Regional Plan of Action (RPOA) and corresponding National Plans of Action (NPOAs), offering a good example of IOM at both regional and national levels. The RPOA is guided by principles of integration, inclusive stakeholder participation, multilevel governance, and recognition of the unique fragility and vulnerability of island ecosystems. To ensure policy coherence across all six member countries, NPOAs align national goals with regional objectives through interagency and multisectoral collaborations. Each country then develops its own implementation strategies to strengthen ocean governance.
Bilateral and multilateral development partners, including USAID, the Australian Government, and the Asian Development Bank, have provided financial and technical assistance to support this intergovernmental initiative. Development co-operation partners have contributed to formulating guidelines for designing marine reserve networks within broader spatial planning frameworks, addressing biodiversity conservation, fisheries management, climate change adaptation, and coastal management. They have also supported the creation of geospatial databases and data analysis tools, enhancing planning efforts across different scales and improving the knowledge base for informed decision making.
Source: Coral Triangle Initiative (2024[6]), Coral Triangle Initiative, https://www.coraltriangleinitiative.org/.
Enable developing country participation in international ocean processes
Promoting the equitable participation of developing countries in the design of global ocean-related legal regimes is essential. The legal regimes governing the ocean are constantly evolving (with negotiations for a global plastics treaty being one good example). By listening to what measures, responses and mechanisms are needed by developing countries, providers can take steps (e.g. through advocacy) to ensure that partner countries’ needs and priorities are reflected in ocean governance.
Development co-operation providers can also play a role through technical assistance and financial support, especially to enable underrepresented groups to participate in international governance. In 2024, a decision was made at the CBD COP16 to create a permanent subsidiary body that will include Indigenous peoples and local communities in future biodiversity decisions related to both life on land and under water (UN, 2024[7]). This means that they will be able to contribute formally to negotiations and their input into formal decision-making will be increased in line with their role as key stewards of the natural environment. Box 6.2 presents an example of how local communities in Kenya were supported to have a say in international ocean governance.
The issue of equal participation in ocean governance also applies directly to landlocked states. Despite having no physical access to the sea, landlocked developing countries are still affected by the ocean (e.g. through its role as a regulator of a stable climate). Incorporating willing partner countries in international ocean governance can help ensure that their unique perspectives are heard. This can be done through more robust implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which created rules to facilitate the rights of landlocked states “to participate, on equitable basis, in the exploitation of the surplus of the living resources of the exclusive economic zone of coastal states” in the same region (UN, 2023[2]).
The Elmolo are a traditional fishing community on the coast of Kenya. Indigenous peoples and local communities in the country have continuously been losing their living areas for activities like forestry, agriculture and mining, and the expansion of conservation areas. In addition, stakeholders from outside have taken over lands belonging to these Indigenous peoples and local communities. Through these processes, the communities' cultural traditions and natural resource base have been eroded.
A project led by Finland enabled multiple Indigenous communities to join forces in an effort to strengthen their biocultural continuity and push for the rights of Indigenous peoples and local communities, nationally and internationally – using, among other things, the international conventions and treaties supporting the rights of Indigenous peoples and local communities. This project strengthens the communities' land rights and the protection of biodiversity with the help of community biocultural protocols. These document the cultural structures, management systems and procedures based on the communities' traditional knowledge, their territories and natural resources; assess the challenges facing them; and outline legal and political instruments to strengthen the protection of the community interests. During the implementation of the project, and based on its outputs, the understanding of the legal rights of the communities in question and their cultural characteristics also increased among key stakeholders (such as the government authorities, the research community and civil society actors).
Harmonise existing standards and taxonomies relevant to global ocean finance
To reduce fragmentation and enhance coordination and coherence in financing for a sustainable ocean economy, it is essential to promote the harmonisation of standards (Table 4.3 contains the list of actors relevant for the sustainable ocean economy). This will help to enhance development effectiveness. Harmonisation of standards and principles across development co-operation providers could also help to increase transparency and reduce transaction costs. Support for the continuous improvement of standards, frameworks and taxonomies, informed by the latest science and practitioners’ experiences, can also help to ensure they remain relevant, up-to-date, easy-to-use and robust.
Development co-operation providers can begin by aligning their own efforts with existing standards. These include general guiding frameworks for aligning public and private financing with SDG 14, such as the UNEP FI’s Sustainable Blue Economy Finance Principles (UNEP Finance Initiative, n.d.[8]) and Recommended Exclusions for Financing a Sustainable Blue Economy (UNEP Finance Initiative, 2021[176]), as well as the UN Global Compact’s Ocean Investment Protocol (UN Global Compact, 2024[9]). Sustainability standards that apply to specific ocean economy sectors may also be instructive. These include the Marine Stewardship Council label for seafood from certified sustainable fisheries, the Principles for Investment in Wild-Caught Sustainable Fisheries, and the Poseidon Principles for responsible ship finance (Poseidon Principles, 2024[10]). Standards have also emerged to ensure high quality and integrity in projects centred on nature-based solutions, especially blue carbon projects. These include the High Quality Blue Carbon Principles and Guidance developed by a coalition of environmental organisations (Ocean Risk Alliance, 2022[11]).1 Development co-operation providers can also share their experiences and lessons learned with the various frameworks to ensure others adopt good practices.
Development co-operation providers can themselves advocate for common standards across the wide range of financial actors in the ocean economy. This can be carried out in their role as shareholders of multilateral development banks, and as direct contributors to global environmental funds, both of which are notable channels of ocean-related development finance (one example is PROBLUE; see Box 6.3).
PROBLUE is a multi-donor trust fund housed at the World Bank, which supports the development of integrated, sustainable and healthy marine and coastal resources. PROBLUE contributes to the implementation of SDG 14. The fund is supported by Australia, Canada, Denmark, the European Commission, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
One of its key areas is developing government capacity to manage marine resources, including nature-based infrastructure such as mangroves, in an integrated way to deliver more and long-lasting benefits to countries and communities.
Source: World Bank (2021[12]), Riding the Blue Wave: Applying the Blue Economy Approach to World Bank Operations, http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/099655003182224941.
Support continued policy discussions on emerging approaches to financing the ocean as a global public good, while managing risks of fragmentation
Global discussions on financing for sustainable development have underscored the need to finance global public goods (GPGs). For instance, the Bridgetown Initiative has proposed an ambitious agenda for reform of the international financial architecture. It includes calls for new sources of progressive finance to fund GPGs and the response to loss and damage, including through an international tax on the super-rich; repurposing harmful subsidies; and a philanthropy-funded Global Compact for GPGs. The initiative has also proposed taxing fossil fuel companies’ windfall profits and implementing an emissions levy on hard-to-abate sectors like aviation and shipping, along with international financial transactions underpinned by a comprehensive UN Tax Convention to create a forum for truly inclusive tax negotiations. The Bridgetown Initiative also calls upon developed countries to meaningfully capitalise and effectively operationalise the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage (FRLD) and deliver on the commitment to increase international biodiversity finance to at least USD 30 billion per year by 2030, in line with the KMGBF (Bridgetown Initiative, 2024[13]).
Several emerging approaches and schemes are relevant to financing the ocean as a global public good. These include:
Global solidarity levies: The Global Solidarity Levies Task Force supports the idea of a solidarity levy on maritime shipping as an ambitious funding mechanism for ocean solidarity. Negotiations are currently under way under the guidance of the IMO to develop and implement a levy which would put a price on GHGs emitted by the maritime transport industry with the aim of reaching net zero emissions in the sector by 2050 (Global Solidarity Levies Task Force, 2024[14]).. Additionally, a plastics production levy was also tabled at the COP29 Climate Summit, to be levied on producing plastics from polymers rather than from recycled material. It was suggested this could yield USD 25bn-USD 35bn a year if set at USD 60 to USD 90 a tonne, and some of the funds could be mobilised to support ocean health and conservation efforts through actions to tackle marine pollution (Global Solidarity Levies Task Force, 2024[14]).
International cost-sharing approaches: The exploitation of marine and seabed resources for new ocean-based extractive sectors can produce short-term revenues for individual developing countries. However, financial gains could potentially be highly concentrated and difficult to reconcile with inclusive development. Destructive environmental impacts, meanwhile, could be huge and extend well beyond national borders, with global consequences for the ocean’s ability to regulate climate, store carbon, and provide livelihoods and food. New international development co-operation schemes might be needed to compensate developing countries and ensure an international cost-sharing mechanism for the protection of the ocean as a global public good. For instance, a scheme based on REDD+ for forests, but adapted for the ocean, could be explored.
While there is uncertainty over the eventual adoption of these different approaches, supporting policy discussions that generate long-term reliable funding for the ocean is important. Ensuring that multiple diverging or duplicate approaches are avoided, however, is essential for preventing fragmentation in attempts to address financing needs for the ocean. Development co-operation providers have a crucial role in ensuring that developing countries’ perspectives on the ocean finance architecture are brought to the forefront.
Consider mechanisms to co-ordinate the different components of the global ocean finance architecture
A first step towards co-ordinating the global ocean finance architecture would to be enhance transparency over who exactly is deploying funds relevant for the sustainable ocean economy. While Table 4.3 lists the type of actors active in the sustainable ocean economy, there isn’t complete clarity on the specific multilateral funds, private sector actors, bilateral providers, and philanthropic organisations operating in the ocean economy. A granular mapping of this landscape (e.g. examining the share of ocean-relevant activities in an institution’s portfolio) would be an important step in designing mechanisms to co-ordinate different players.
Clarity on the landscape of ocean finance can allow development co-operation providers to consider specific mechanisms that can strengthen co-ordination. These could include voluntary coalitions – such as the Finance in Common Summit Ocean Coalition – which brings together Public Development Banks (PDBs) of different types and geographies committed to collaborate towards sustainable ocean finance (FICS, 2023[15]). Regardless of the approach chosen, the ultimate aim would be to reduce fragmentation, transaction costs, and incoherencies across the ocean finance landscape.
Scale back subsidies that harm the ocean economy
Development co-operation providers can play a role in the proactive phasing out of subsidies that encourage unsustainable practices in the ocean economy. Almost two-thirds (65%) of total support to fisheries (2020-22 average) presented a moderate or high risk of encouraging unsustainable fishing in the absence of effective management (see Figure 6.1). This support artificially lowers the costs of fishing (e.g. fuel and vessels) allowing fishers to operate farther out to sea and for longer periods of time. This increased fishing effort and capacity can undermine the sustainability of fisheries, including outside the boundaries of the subsidising country’s waters. Therefore, ongoing harmful subsidisation of large commercial fishing fleets can put small-scale and artisanal fishers, including in developing countries, at a disadvantage. As a result, it is important to ensure that support to the fisheries sector does not encourage overfishing, IUU fishing, or other fishing practices that destroy ocean ecosystems, compromise the sustainability of resources, and undermine livelihoods. Policy coherence for sustainable development is key to ensuring that development co-operation providers’ national or regional fisheries policies either support or do not undermine their development efforts.
Source: OECD (2025[16]), OECD Review of Fisheries 2025, https://doi.org/10.1787/560cd8fc-en.
Influence a transition to a sustainable ocean economy through domestic policy levers and other multilateral fora
To promote global policy coherence, development co-operation providers can use levers in other multilateral fora to accelerate a global transition to a sustainable ocean economy. For example, through contributions to discussions at the IMO, development co-operation providers can not only shape targets and strategies, but also inform the design of the specific instruments to encourage polluters to reduce their GHG emissions (Englert and Losos, 2021[17]). Coherence at the international level can reduce risks of distorting competition and carbon leakage as each member state implements the same regulation. Global policy changes can also prompt innovation that can help mitigate threats to a sustainable ocean economy that transcend national borders. Corbett et al. (2016[18]), for example, have studied how IMO policy developments promote innovation in ballast water treatment technologies.
In addition to mainstreaming principles of responsible business conduct in their engagement with the private sector, development co-operation providers can use domestic policies to trigger a shift in private sector activities towards a sustainable ocean economy. For example, to mainstream sustainability in all global investments for the ocean economy, providers can consider strengthening firms’ reporting requirements on ocean impacts, introducing ocean sustainability criteria in stock exchange listings, and establishing regulations to improve the traceability of goods and services from the ocean economy (OECD, 2020[19]).
References
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[15] FICS (2023), Public Development Banks Call to Deliver Positive Action, https://financeincommon.org/sites/default/files/2023-09/Cartagena%20FiCS%20Call%20for%20Action_Ocean_FINAL_1.pdf.
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[14] Global Solidarity Levies Task Force (2024), Scaling Solidarity: Progress on Global Solidarity Levies, https://solidaritylevies.org/app/uploads/2024/11/GSLTF-Scaling-Solidarity-Progress-on-Global-Solidarity-Levies-report.pdf.
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[10] Poseidon Principles (2024), Poseidon Principles: A global framework for responsible ship finance, https://www.poseidonprinciples.org/finance/#home.
[3] Rieu-Clarke, A. and C. Spray (2013), “Ecosystem services and international water law: towards a more effective determination and implementation of equity?”, Potchefstroom Electronic Law Journal/Potchefstroomse Elektroniese Regsblad, Vol. 16/2, https://doi.org/10.4314/pelj.v16i2.3.
[7] UN (2024), Biodiversity COP 16: Important Agreement Reached Towards Goal of “Making Peace with Nature”, https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/blog/2024/11/biodiversity-cop-16-important-agreement-reached-towards-goal-of-making-peace-with-nature-2/.
[2] UN (2023), Agreement under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea on the conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction, https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/4013344?v=pdf&ln=en.
[9] UN Global Compact (2024), Ocean Investment Protocol, https://unglobalcompact.org/library/6244.
[8] UNEP Finance Initiative (n.d.), Sustainable Blue Economy Finance Principles, https://www.unepfi.org/blue-finance/the-principles/.
[12] World Bank (2021), Riding the Blue Wave: Applying the Blue Economy Approach to World Bank Operations, http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/099655003182224941.
← 1. For further details of these standards, see Annex Table A.A.1 and Table A.A.2.