Matter Commented On: General Assembly Resolution - Development of an international
legally-binding instrument 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, A/RES/69/292
A recent review article in Science predicts a major extinction event in the oceans if human
impacts on the marine environment go unchecked because of the ‘profoundly deleterious
impacts’ that our activities are having on marine life (Douglas J McCauley and others, ‘Marine
defaunation: animal loss in the global ocean’ (2015) 347 Science 247). Pressures on marine
ecosystems, including ecosystems beyond national jurisdiction, arise from pollution, overfishing,
expanded shipping, marine mining, energy development, intensified aquaculture, as well as
ocean warming and acidification. The authors of the article still hold out some hope: there
remains a chance that we can reverse this trend if we engage in more effective management of
the oceans and if we can slow climate change