Asia-Pacific can lead in race to save the ocean economy

"UNPRECEDENTED" might be judged the most used adjective of 2020, and too often for dire reasons.

Yet the end of 2020 brought one more occasion to use the word. The High Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy (known as the Ocean Panel), an initiative by leaders of 14 countries, on Dec 2, 2020, put forward a new ocean action agenda by committing to a 100 per cent sustainable ocean management and 100 per cent of national waters, and called for more countries to join.

Asia-Pacific nations were well represented on the High Level Panel by leaders of Australia, Fiji, Indonesia, Japan and Palau.