Saving the Ocean Starts with Us

Aquariums are ideal ambassadors for #OurOcean, educating thousands of citizens, including children.

Ahead of the EU hosting the Our Ocean Conference in Malta this week I visited Baltimore’s National Aquarium. The aquarium was one of the first of over 130 aquariums worldwide to join our “World Aquariums Against Marine Litter” campaign.

The campaign highlights how marine litter kills millions of animals each year. With up to 12.7 million tons of plastic waste entering our oceans every year, our ocean could contain more plastic than fish by the year 2050. How do we stop this unfolding ecological disaster?

The solution starts with us: cutting down our use of disposable plastic products, recycling and reusing. A small act by each of us can result in a massive impact on a global scale.

As one of the three founding partners of the Aquarium Conservation Partnership (ACP), the National Aquarium exemplifies “walking the talk.” Not only have they encouraged more than 15,000 aquarium visitors to pledge to take a pass on plastic, they are pioneering efforts to eliminate single-use plastic foodware in all their café spaces and sell reusable water bottles alongside toys made from 100% post-consumer milk jugs.

Since early 2014, filling station counters have saved over 730,000 single-use plastic bottles from being used.

Improving the lives of marine animals will also be the focus of our conference in Malta. Our Ocean Conferences invite world leaders to deliver high-level commitments to protect oceans from pollution, overexploitation, coastal degradation and global warming. The first three Our Ocean Conferences have committed over $9.2 billion and led to the designation of 9.9 million square kilometers as new Marine Protected Areas — an area equivalent to the size of the United States.

At this year’s conference EU Environment Commissioner Karmenu Vella has said we can expect significant contributions from the EU, its 28 Member States and the private sector, totaling well above $1 billion. And we will be looking to other countries to follow suit. We urgently need to identify solutions and get action-oriented commitments that will protect and conserve our ocean and its resources.

We all depend on the ocean — and the ocean and ocean life depend on us doing the right thing.

The “Our Ocean” conference will take place October 5–6 in Valletta, Malta. Visit ourocean2017.org and watch this video to learn more: