Discussion 7

OPINION

We need a global movement to transform ocean science for a better world Linwood Pendletona,b,c,d,1, Karen Evanse, and Martin Visbeckf,g

The ocean is our planet’s largest life-support system. It stabilizes climate; stores carbon; produces oxygen; nurtures biodiversity; directly supports human well-being through food, mineral, and energy resources; and pro- vides cultural and recreational services. The value of the ocean economy speaks to its importance: The

Organization for Economic Cooperation and Develop- ment (OECD) estimates that by 2030, $3 trillion USD will be generated annually from ocean sectors such as transportation, fishing, tourism, and energy (1). Unsus- tainable resource extraction, pollution, climate change, and habitat destruction are on the rise and affecting

Although improved ocean management and conservation have helped to reduce threats and restore some key ecosystems, the basic benefits that people receive from a healthy ocean are in overall decline. Image credit: © World Wildlife Fund (WWF-US)/James Morgan.

aGlobal Science, World Wildlife Fund, Washington, DC 20037; bOcean Data Foundation, Lysaker 1366, Norway; cGlobal Change Institute, Uni- versity of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland 4072, Australia; dIfremer, CNRS, UMR 6308, AMURE, Institut Universitaire European de le Mer, University of Western Brittany, Plouzané 29280, France; eCommonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation Oceans and Atmosphere, Hobart, Tasmania 7001, Australia; fOcean Circulation and Climate Dynamics/Physical Oceanography, GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, 24105, Kiel, Germany; and gOcean Circulation and Climate Dynamics/Physical Oceanography, Kiel University, 24118, Kiel, Germany The authors declare no competing interest. Published under the PNAS license. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this work are those of the authors and have not been endorsed by the National Academy of Sciences. 1To whom correspondence may be addressed. Email: [email protected]. First published April 15, 2020.

9652–9655 | PNAS | May 5, 2020 | vol. 117 | no. 18 www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.2005485117

O P IN

IO N

D o w

n lo

a d e d b

y g u e st

o n O

ct o b e r

4 , 2 0 2 1

many parts of the world’s oceans (2). The ocean is rap- idly changing, and yet the ways in which these changes will play out are not yet clear.

Although improved management and conserva- tion have helped to reduce threats and restore some key ecosystems, the basic benefits that people receive from a healthy ocean are in overall decline (3). If left unchecked, a growing and resource-hungry human population will add additional pressures on the ocean. Scientific research, experimentation, data collection, monitoring, and modeling provide the knowledge, frameworks, and evidence needed to model and ex- plore the environmental consequences of policy and development proposals and thus to chart a sustain- able future ocean.

The current scale, pace, and practice of ocean scientific discovery and observation are not keeping up with the changes in ocean and human conditions. We need fundamental changes in the way that researchers work with decision makers to co-create knowledge that will address pressing development problems. Researchers need to share their data more freely and sooner so that their work can inform decisions in near real time. Academia, government, and industry need to find new and better ways to

collaborate and innovate. Huge gaps in scientific capacity and capability around the world will require that we fundamentally change the way we train and employ researchers from developing countries. Above all, we need to dramatically expand the breadth of disciplines that are directly involved in new transdisci- plinary ocean research.

Accelerating Ocean Science To catalyze this transformation, the United Nations (UN) General Assembly has called for a Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021– 2030), “The Decade,” to develop the frameworks and tools required for the sustainable development of the ocean. The aim of The Decade is to create a new movement for bringing together researchers and stakeholders from all relevant sectors to generate a new scientific process to inform policies that ensure a well-functioning, productive, resilient, and sustainable ocean (ref. 4; Fig. 1) and support the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and associated Sus- tainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Roughly 40% of the world’s population lives within 100 km of a coast (5). More than 600 million people currently live in low-elevation coastal zones, a number

Fig. 1. The UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development seeks to link stakeholders and researchers in hopes of catalyzing the science needed to improve ocean ecology function and human well-being. Image credit: Vanessa González-Ortiz (artist).

Pendleton et al. PNAS | May 5, 2020 | vol. 117 | no. 18 | 9653

D o w

n lo

a d e d b

y g u e st

o n O

ct o b e r

4 , 2 0 2 1

that is expected to grow to more than a billion by 2050 (6). These coastal seas are hotspots of human–ocean interactions and are also regions where humans are at elevated risks from ocean threats (e.g., storm surges and tsunamis) and changes in the ocean conditions (e.g., sea level rise and associated coastal erosion). A sustainable coastal ocean requires an improved ca- pacity to measure and monitor the ocean, its health, and function in coastal areas to assess the effective- ness of policy interventions, and create better fore- casting and prediction to help stakeholders understand future ocean-related impacts on coastal communities, so they can better plan and regulate the human uses of coastal ecosystems.

Great progress has been made in describing, un- derstanding, and enhancing our ability to predict changes in the ocean system (e.g., 7.). Satellites and globally operating platforms have dramatically in- creased our ability to measure and monitor ocean conditions (8, 9). However, we often still lack the ability to quickly get these data into the hands of decision makers in a way that is relevant and can help them sustainably manage human uses and impacts in the vast and rapidly changing global ocean.

Technical and logistical constraints, government policies, global scientific capacity and capability, lack of effective knowledge sharing, geopolitical disputes, and ongoing military conflict challenge our ability to collect and share in situ data in some parts of the world, resulting in many geographic gaps in observations. For example, measurements of ocean conditions (e.g., ocean acidity, nitrification, ecological health) are nota- bly scarce in the Coral Triangle region of the western Pacific Ocean, the South China Sea, and coastal East Africa, all areas of high significance for potential coral reef refugia (10). These are also places where meeting the UN 2030 Agenda and associated SDGs will be critically important for growing populations, but at the same time highly challenging (11).

Many aspects of the subsurface ocean, including basic oceanographic conditions and biodiversity, are still not fully understood, including in the polar re- gions, the seabed, and many high seas and deep seas areas and their underlying seabeds. These resource- rich areas are the subject of rapidly developing in- ternational policy, including new treaties for the management of the high seas, new leases for seafloor mining, and proposed measures to protect bio- diversity in the areas beyond national jurisdiction, that needs to be informed by good ocean knowledge, data, and science. Until these vast areas are better understood and characterized, exploitation of mineral and energy resources and efforts to manage fisheries and ocean industries will neither be properly informed nor effective in reducing impacts and risks associated with these potentially threatening uses (12, 13).

The full spectrum of benefits that humans receive from a well-functioning ocean are still poorly un- derstood. As a result, researchers know little about the significance of biodiversity and habitat changes or loss, about whether we’re approaching key tipping

points, or about whether responses to ocean disasters are timely and effective.

A lack of access about ocean health data, over time, limits what we can glean about how the ocean has responded to past human pressures such as fish- ing, shipping, mining, and coastal agriculture and development, as well as the longer-term conse- quences for future sustainability. Many relevant data streams from long-term ecological research and local monitoring programs, even those made public, may not be easily found, accessed, or interpreted. Private data streams from businesses and industry—for ex- ample, those used to route ships and exploit marine resources—are never shared publicly (14, 15). The joint Academies of Sciences of the G20 countries have highlighted the need to better coordinate and in- tegrate the collection, management, analysis, and sharing of these interdisciplinary data streams and asso- ciated knowledge that comes from the analysis of these data (15). Better means of sharing and accessing data would improve our ability to conduct interdisciplinary science on regional and global scales. Only a concerted global effort can align the many existing data networks to facilitate sustainable development.

Catalyzing Ocean Science To nurture the ocean science needed for sustainable development, we believe that the next generation of ocean science will need to improve how we:

1. Identify and routinely measure essential variables related to the climate, ocean processes and socio- ecological systems that can serve as sentinels of ocean health,

2. In association with industry, develop new and low- cost technologies, including new sensors and new methodological approaches, to measure and mon- itor these ocean variables,

3. Establish new public-private partnerships in ocean observing, data distribution, and information prod- uct delivery between science, engineering, and in- formation technology communities, and

4. Develop new tracking and prediction capacities to support integrated, multi-hazard, early warning systems, improved community preparedness, and awareness.

5. Establish innovative ways to share data, informa- tion, and knowledge amongst all stakeholders in an open, transparent, and equitable manner.

6. Advance efforts to build a “digital twin ocean” to explore, discover, and visualize current and future oceans.

7. Build science capacity and capability through new ways of training, mobilizing resources, sharing of infrastructure, and exchanging of experts and knowledge across, nations, institutions, and disciplines.

To achieve these changes, researchers need to embrace “whole earth” approaches to ocean obser- vation, analysis, and modeling that include all relevant disciplines and people from the start to allow com- munities to better account and plan for the complex

9654 | www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.2005485117 Pendleton et al.

D o w

n lo

a d e d b

y g u e st

o n O

ct o b e r

4 , 2 0 2 1

and often nonlinear processes that drive ocean sys- tems and the many pressures impacting them.

Large portions of the public are aware that pres- sures such as overfishing and pollution have a major impact on the ocean. But few understand the func- tioning of the ocean, the services it provides, or how their day-to-day activities might be impacting the ocean (16; e.g., 17). We as researchers must simplify the language we use to more clearly and openly communicate complex ocean science and sustainable development issues across cultures and languages. Researchers must actively target future generations and take into consideration the emerging technology and digital platforms used to communicate. Finally, researchers need new media allies to reach out to new communities by partnering with personalities from the business or entertainment world.

A New Era for Ocean Science The UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development has already embarked on a new stake- holder process that will be inclusive, participatory, and global in its approach to plan, implement, and deliver the science required for meeting the SDGs. To suc- ceed, this process will require fundamentally new ways of bringing all ocean stakeholders together so that parties with a vested interest, from small-scale indigenous fishers to large-scale corporate leaders, can participate in a solutions-focused scientific pro- cess for generating new ocean knowledge.

Whether The Decade can achieve a transformation in ocean science will depend on the joint efforts of researchers, engineers, and scholars from all disci- plines working in close collaboration with stakeholders from all sectors of the community. Although The De- cade does not formally begin until 2021, the time is now for all stakeholders, including researchers, to come together to develop and sponsor these trans- formative events, propose new projects and partner- ships, and to be part of new global community of ocean science for sustainable development. We en- courage all of our colleagues to join this community at http://www.oceandecade.org, to begin to build new relationships with nonscience stakeholders, and to embrace a new era of innovation, data sharing, and scientific cocreation.

Acknowledgments The authors acknowledge all of the members of the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Develop- ment’s Executive Planning Group (EPG; https://en.unesco.org/ ocean-decade/epg) for inspiring this article and for participat- ing in the writing of a longer paper with a similar focus. Addi- tionally, the authors thank the staff and leadership of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission for their assistance in communicating with the EPG and for organizing the work of the first Global Planning Meeting. Although the ideas in this manuscript are those of the authors, the authors acknowledge that these ideas were inspired by and reflect ideas expressed by the many members of the EPG as well as the participants of the Global Planning Meeting. Finally, the authors thank Vanessa González-Ortiz (http://vgonzalezortiz.com) for the figure artwork.

1 OECD, The Ocean Economy in 2030. (OECD, Paris, France, 2016). https:/doi.org/10.1787/9789264251724-en. Accessed 5 November 2019.

2 United Nations, The First Global Integrated Marine Assessment, (Cambridge University Press, 2016). https:/doi.org/10.1017/ 9781108186148.

3 IPBES, Global assessment report on biodiversity and ecosystem services of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, E. S. Brondizio, J. Settele, S. Dı́az, H. T. Ngo, Eds. (IPBES Secretariat, Bonn, Germany, 2019).

4 IOC-UNESCO, “The Science we need for the ocean we want: the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030)” (2019).

5 United Nations, “Ocean Fact Sheet Package” (2017). 6 B. Neumann, A. T. Vafeidis, J. Zimmermann, R. J. Nicholls, Future coastal population growth and exposure to sea-level rise and coastal flooding: A global assessment. PLoS One 10, e0118571 (2015).

7 K. A. Alexander et al., Progress in integrating natural and social science in marine ecosystem-based management research. Mar. Freshw. Res. 70, 71–83 (2019).

8 S. C. Riser et al., Fifteen years of ocean observations with the global Argo array. Nat. Clim. Chang. 6, 145–153 (2016). 9 J. D. Shutler et al., Progress in satellite remote sensing for studying physical processes at the ocean surface and its borders with the atmosphere and sea ice. Prog. Phys. Geogr. 40, 215–246 (2016).

10 O. Hoegh-Guldberg, E. V. Kennedy, H. L. Beyer, C. McClennen, H. P. Possingham, Securing a long-term future for coral reefs. Trends Ecol. Evol. (Amst.) 33, 936–944 (2018).

11 J. M. Shultz, M. A. Cohen, S. Hermosilla, Z. Espinel, A. McLean, Disaster risk reduction and sustainable development for small island developing states. Disaster Health 3, 32–44 (2016).

12 R. Danovaro et al., An ecosystem-based deep-ocean strategy. Science 355, 452–454 (2017). 13 United Nations, The Conservation and Sustainable Use of Marine Biological Diversity of Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction (United

Nations, 2017) https:/doi.org/10.18356/29045c1f-en. Accessed 21 May 2019. 14 K. Evans, N. J. Bax, D. C. Smith, Enhancing the robustness of a national assessment of the marine environment. Mar. Policy 98, 133–

145 (2018). 15 Science 20, “S20 Japan 2019 Science 20 Threats to Coastal and Marine Ecosystems, and Conservation of the Ocean Environment –

with Special Attention to Climate Change and Marine Plastic Waste” (2019). 16 G. Fauville et al., Development of the International Ocean Literacy Survey: Measuring knowledge across the world. Environ. Educ.

Res. 4622, 1–26 (2018). 17 B. S. Steel, C. Smith, L. Opsommer, S. Curiel, R. Warner-steel, Public ocean literacy in the United States. Ocean Coast. Manage. 48,

97–114 (2005).

Pendleton et al. PNAS | May 5, 2020 | vol. 117 | no. 18 | 9655

D o w

n lo

a d e d b

y g u e st

o n O

ct o b e r

4 , 2 0 2 1