We are gathered here at a critical time for oceans. Make no mistake: Oceans are changing. They are changing rapidly and radically, with profound consequences for humanity. Hope remains but time is running out. Now is the time for engagement if we wish to redirect the global trajectory and transition to sustainable uses and to healthy oceans and coasts….
The once healthy, productive coastal ocean off the beautiful Pacific Northwest coast became a seasonal dead zone each year due to changing patterns of winds and oceanic circulation that are most likely due to climate change.
From the tropics to the poles, disruption and depletion were playing out in alarming ways. The unintended — but nevertheless very real — consequences of coastal development, overfishing, nutrient pollution and climate change were taking their toll.
As a result, I began to expand my scientific efforts and work with colleagues to develop solutions:
• Ways to use oceans without using them up;
• Ways to reduce nutrient and chemical pollution flowing from the land;
• Ways to farm seafood sustainably;
• Ways to limit and adapt to the impacts of climate change;
• Ways to recover the lost bounty and health of oceans so they can provide the services that people want and need.
The Joint Oceans Commission Initiative, initially led by Admiral Watkins, Leon Panetta, and Bill Ruckelshaus provided champions and a mechanism to promote action. Numerous organizations amplified and developed the messages and new approaches. Congress took action in reauthorizing the Magnuson-Stevens Act, emphasizing ecosystem-based management and ending overfishing.
NOAA implemented the new rules, mapped essential fish habitat, and developed new methodologies for integrated ecosystem assessments. Academic scientists, fishermen and NGOs provided new analyses and knowledge about sustainable fishing, catch shares and marine reserves. A number of states and communities took up the challenge and began embracing some of the recommendations around marine spatial planning and ecosystem-based management. And neighboring coastal states formed regional alliances to collaborate on ocean efforts.
Progress on multiple fronts provided impetus to create a more systemic and comprehensive framework for effective and integrated federal action. In June of 2009, President Obama established his Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force and charged it with making recommendations to ‘enhance national stewardship of the ocean, coasts and Great Lakes and promote the long term conservation and use of these resources’. (editor's note, the Commercial Fishing industry is represented on the Task Force by Dr. Lubchenco, since NMFS is part of NOAA. There is no other representation for Commercial Fishing interests on the Task Force.)
Led by Nancy Sutley of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, the Task Force engaged 24 senior-level policy officials from across the Federal Government and their staff in an intense effort to work with the public and a wide range of stakeholders and respond to the President’s charge. Many of you participated actively in that effort, to the benefit of the results.