The Ship Has Reached the Shore: The High Seas Treaty Explained

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There's a video online of a room
full of pretty much exhausted

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diplomats breaking into applause
after nearly 20 years of work.

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One woman is shown bringing down the
gavel and says, " The ship has reached

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the shore." And that moment ended a
treaty negotiation that had already

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failed once in public two years ago, or I
even think a year ago, like before that.

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And it just became binding
international law this year, and the

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fight over what it actually protects
is happening exactly right now.

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This is the How to Protect the
Ocean podcast, your information

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for everything that has to do with
ocean, whether it's news, science,

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conservation, stories that I like
to tell about what's been happening.

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This is a story that we're gonna talk
about today about the High Seas Treaty,

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or what's known as the Borders Beyond
National Jurisdiction, so the BBNJ.

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We're gonna talk about the history of it.

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We're gonna talk about why it took
so long to put together and what

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is actually involved, and how it's
gonna make the world a better place if

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everything works out the way it does.

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Or again, if you listened to yesterday's
episode when we talk about public

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policy and we talk about how putting
something in place right now is better

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than not putting in place at all, and
building on the baseline and building

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up to get more protections later on.

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Having public policy in place now is
better than not having anything at all.

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Remember that when people come to
you about policy or try to critique

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you about policy not being perfect.

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It's never perfect, it never
will be perfect, but we can get

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to near, damn near close, and I
think it's important to do that.

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All right, so let's just go
through, like, the history.

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So, 2004, the idea first surfaces
at the UN Oceans Working Session.

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So it's like, "Hey, we need to protect
the high seas," which is everything

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beyond the national jurisdiction.

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So the exclusive economic zone stretches
out 200 nautical miles from shore

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for every country, and so anything
within that EEZ, that country protects.

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So Canada has a 200 nautical mile
limit all around, it's the longest

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coastline in the world, and it
protects everything in there.

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It's responsible for everything
in there, so it can do pretty much

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whatever it wants or anything in
those exclusive economic zones.

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Same with every, any other country, right?

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Sovereign country.

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Now, so at this point, anything
beyond those borders though is

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pretty much open to anybody.

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Nobody has jurisdiction.

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People can fish outside of Canada's
borders, the Exclusive economic zone,

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Argentina, wherever that is, wherever
those fish are, they can actually go.

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So, like, when the cod stock was huge,
you know, we were getting a lot of

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Portuguese and Spanish fishing fleets
that were coming over and sitting on, on

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that border, sometimes crossing it, which
was a big no-no, and fishing the cod.

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But we were already having problems
with cod, and so we didn't wanna have

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that problem be caused by somebody
else or helped caused by somebody else.

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So we wanted to protect our borders,
and so we had to send out Coast

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Guard ships and even Navy ships
at some point, to scare them off.

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So anything beyond those borders,
the national jurisdiction,

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it's pretty much Wild West.

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You can pretty much do whatever you want.

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So the idea in 2004 first surfaced at
the UN Oceans working session, and from

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2006 to 2015, there was, like, an ad hoc
open-ended informal working group that

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meets, like, nine separate times just to
study whether a treaty was even needed.

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Like, think about that.

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You're spending almost 10 years,
right, nine years going after, like,

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"Hey, do we actually need this or
not?" So in 2015, the working group

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finally recommends to the UN, " We
actually need this draft," right?

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"We have to have draft one. Like,
let's go for draft one." And so

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2016 to 2017, there's a preparatory
committee holds four sessions to rough

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out what the treaty should contain.

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And then 2018 to 2023, a formal
intergovernmental conference

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holds five negotiating sessions
to write the actual legal text.

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"We should probably think about this,"
to a finished treaty, which is, a good

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concrete answer to why does international
policy move so slowly, is because

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you're dealing with so many countries.

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You're dealing with the world, all the
countries, and they have to agree.

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And it took two decades to just be
like, "Hey, we should probably think

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about this. We should probably do this,"
and then have those discussions start.

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So it takes a long time to
negotiate these types of treaties.

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Now, what are they actually fighting over?

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And it comes down to really
four pillars, that's in the

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BBNJ or the High Seas Treaty.

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I'll refer to it as the
High Seas Treaty right now.

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So the first pillar, who gets to
profit from marine genetic resources

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discovered in international waters?

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So deep sea organisms used
in medicine or biotech.

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If, say, Canada or the US goes into the
Philippines and catches these animals

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and we're like, "Oh, actually, you
know what? We studied them, and they

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can cure cancer." Well, that's great.

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Well, the pharmaceutical companies make
all the money, like in Canada and the

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US, but then what about the Philippines?

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Those animals were found there.

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You went into the waters near there.

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They should have a cut of that profit
as well because they just didn't

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have the ability to go get it, cause
they don't have the money to do so.

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So it's like how those benefits get shared
with countries that can't afford deep

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sea research fleets of their own, right?

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It's an important part of that equity
that we see around the world that

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needs to happen around the world.

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Same thing with climate change, right?

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When we have these carbon credits
where you can trade carbon credits, but

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also some countries pay more for the
consequences of climate change compared

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to others who don't have the technology
to be able to protect themselves, right?

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Now, the other pillar was how to
actually create marine protected

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areas in international waters where
there's no single country that

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has jurisdiction to declare one.

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So who's in charge of that?

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So if a marine protected area gets
put off the coast of Argentina, the

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exclusive economic zone, just off of
that, where the squid come out and it's

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a big fishery, and then you have this
distant water fleet that sits there.

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But if they want that to be
protected, who's gonna manage that?

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It's gonna be Argentina
probably, but who else?

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Their neighbors?

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Is it gonna be some African
countries that come over?

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Is it gonna be China, who has
the largest distant fleet?

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There's gonna be a lot of people who
want access to that, and wanna make

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sure that these marine protected
areas work, but also who manages it?

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Is it every country?

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That's gonna be impossible to
get anything done anytime soon.

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So that kind of goes through that process.

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The third pillar is requiring
environmental impact assessments before

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new high seas activities go forward.

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Now, this is an important one
'cause we talked last week

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a lot about deep sea mining.

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So imagine if the US, no matter what,
wants to go and do something in the

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international waters as it's trying
to do in other places, they would

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have to do an impact assessment.

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The companies would have
to do an impact assessment.

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Who holds them responsible if
they're not on the UNCLOS, the

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UN Convention of Law of the Sea.

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It gets a little complicated,
but that's what the idea is.

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If anybody tries to do deep sea mining
in the international waters, in the

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high seas, they would have to do an
impact assessment be- before going

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forward to show that they're not
gonna do any damage or minimal damage.

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So we'll see how that goes.

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That's the third pillar.

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The fourth pillar, capacity building
and technology transfer, so poorer

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coastal nations aren't locked out of
enforcing or benefiting from any of this.

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Now, this is, again, it's an equity
thing, is to make sure that the

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countries that are near or dear to
these animals that get caught or any

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activities that happen, they have
the ability to do the same thing.

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So it's capacity building for these
countries and technology transfer

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to be able to help and to be able to
do this type of work instead of just

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having to give money from developed
countries to developing countries,

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they can actually do it themselves.

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So these four pillars are big things.

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These are huge, huge items.

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They're huge pillars that if you look
at it right off the bat, if you look

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at the High Seas Treaty, you're like,
"Oh, there's a lot of loopholes in

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here." And again, step-by-step approach.

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This is the first version of
the High Seas Treaty.

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And at this point, we have about 88 to
89 countries that have ratified this.

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So we had 60 that ratified it in September
of 2025 that allowed this treaty to

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go into effect in January 17th, 2026.

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And then that was when we had
60, and then since then we've had

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at least 28 more, maybe even 29.

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It changes every day.

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So that's kinda cool.

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Now, this policy did not
come into play easily.

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It was supposed to be
done in like August 2022.

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And it almost didn't.

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It almost just kinda fell apart.

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So in August 2022, the fifth negotiating
session, IGC5, ended without a deal.

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So negotiators got close, real
progress was made on all of the

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four pillars, but they ran out of
time and couldn't close the gap.

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So there's a time to these negotiations,
and especially the marine genetic

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resources and how to fund implementation.

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So like think about it,
you're almost there.

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You're against the clock, and
you're in this room, windowless

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room, and there are people outside
like running up and down the halls,

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like pacing, waiting for an answer.

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They're so close to the first High
Seas Treaty, yet that doesn't happen.

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Imagine like how people would feel
after that session, the ones that

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were negotiating, trying to get there,
trying to get countries to agree

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to something, compromise, just to
agree to something that is effective.

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You can't just say, "Oh, well yeah,
this country's gonna be able to do

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it, but the other country can't,"

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especially with the sharing of
marine genetic resources, and

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how to fund that implementation.

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It has to come a compromise that everybody
agrees on and it's equal for everybody.

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Nobody's gonna say, " Well,
Russia can do it, but I can't.

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That's gonna be okay with me."

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No, that doesn't happen.

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So the mood afterwards was like, oh, you
know, it was a little defle- defeated,

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but it's like very carefully optimistic.

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They were so close.

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They're like, "We're gonna get it." But
it was a failure even after 18 years of

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work, it was still a failure in 2022.

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And that failure is useful in really
thinking about how hard it is to

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negotiate these types of treaties,
these international treaties.

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It takes a long time.

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We're at 18 years at this point in
the timeline, and nothing has been

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agreed on, or there's some parts,
but it hasn't been fully agreed to.

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You create the pillars.

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It has to be those pillars, and
that's how we're moving forward.

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But it wasn't until a second
try after falling visibly

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short that the world was ready.

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And so, on Friday, you're gonna hear
the description of the interviewee

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that describes the actual moment, the
breakthrough, and she'll never forget it.

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Tied to the High Seas Treaty
finally getting agreed upon.

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And there's a video of that online.

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It's wonderful to hear.

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Like, the chair was Ambassador
Rena Lee of Singapore, President of

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the UN Intergovernmental Conference
of Marine Biodiversity of Areas

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Beyond National Jurisdiction.

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And so, like, she's the
one, boom, the agreement.

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It hits, the gavel goes down.

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She becomes emotional because,
it's 20 years at this point.

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And the agreement on the text was reached
the evening of March 4th, 2023, at the

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UN headquarters in New York at the
resumed fifth session, after a roughly

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36-hour final negotiation marathon.

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So, think about that.

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You don't leave the room for
36 hours, maybe for bathroom

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breaks and food, but that's it.

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And then when she hit that gavel,
she's like, "The ship has reached the

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shore." Like, that line, like, she must
have practiced over and over again.

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Like, how do you make this memorable?

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And I'll tell you,

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Rena made this so memorable.

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"The ship has reached the shore."
And then you had, like, the sustained

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applause and a standing ovation from,
I'm sure, a visibly exhausted room.

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I'll never forget the video.

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I remember watching it and being like,
"Holy cow, this is huge. This is massive."

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We're, like, the kind of the middle to
the end of COVID, mid to the end of COVID.

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Everybody's inside watching on
YouTube like, "This is amazing."

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It made, like, worldwide news.

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And then the treaty was formally adopted
by consensus on June 19th, 2023, so it

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hasn't been put into place at this point.

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Everybody has to adopt it.

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They need a certain amount of countries
to adopt it, and it's closed nearly 20

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years of negotiation in different formats.

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And so, like, the person that
I'm interviewing on Friday, her

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personal eyewitness account, it's
not something that we could, just

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see, but to be in that room while
everybody is looking is just amazing.

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Like, everybody's like, "We're
done. Like, we've done this."

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Now it's up to the countries to ratify it.

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And if you think about it, like
this is not a history lesson.

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This is live right now.

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This is what we're going
through right now.

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The treaty needed 60 countries to ratify
to become a binding international law.

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And that hit it on September
19th, 2025, when Morocco became

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the 60th ratifying nation.

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00:11:36,413 --> 00:11:38,853
Canada wasn't, the US
wasn't, they still aren't.

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These are countries that I would
expect to be on there, maybe not

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00:11:41,293 --> 00:11:44,393
the US these days, but Canada for
sure, and they haven't done it yet.

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Now, the High Seas Treaty formally
entered into force, as I mentioned

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earlier, on January 17th,
2026, which is just this year.

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Like it's just starting.

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It's like a binding law.

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00:11:53,766 --> 00:11:55,786
It's not just a symbolic milestone.

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It's a binding law.

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If you think about roughly two-thirds of
the ocean, close to half of the planet's

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00:12:00,973 --> 00:12:05,813
surface lies on international waters
outside any single country's jurisdiction.

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00:12:06,273 --> 00:12:10,287
Before this treaty, less than 1%
of that had any form of protection.

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Now, the treaty is a primary
legal tool for hitting the

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globally adopted 30 by 30 target.

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Now, we only have less than four
years left to hit that target,

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00:12:18,274 --> 00:12:20,537
protecting 30% of the ocean by 2030.

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Agreed to by 196 countries in 2022.

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00:12:23,744 --> 00:12:26,984
Like, this is another international
agreement, so it builds on it together.

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00:12:27,364 --> 00:12:30,574
Now, there's already been a meeting
in March and April this year, 2026.

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It already happened, and it's
starting to move things forward.

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And then the third session of the
treaty's preparation committee ran

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00:12:36,407 --> 00:12:39,431
on March 23rd, to April, to April
2nd, at the the UN headquarters.

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Over 200 delegates were present.

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So, since then,
ratifications keep climbing.

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00:12:44,774 --> 00:12:47,704
During that meeting itself in March
and April, Dominican Republic and

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00:12:47,734 --> 00:12:51,174
Austria both ratified while delegates
were in the room, so that was huge,

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00:12:51,267 --> 00:12:55,967
bringing the total to 88 parties by
the close of the session on April 2nd.

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And that's the most recent
figure that I've seen.

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I haven't seen anything
else, but there might be 89.

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It's like inconsistent in
some of the other things.

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But if you go on the High Seas Alliance
website, they have the ratification

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line, and it'll tell you how many it has.

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00:13:08,981 --> 00:13:11,141
And as of doing this
recording, there was 88.

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So it's kind of interesting
to see how this is going.

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Now, there is a conference of
parties, a COP1, that is set.

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00:13:16,941 --> 00:13:19,551
So the preparatory commission's
co-chairs recommended the first

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00:13:19,551 --> 00:13:20,931
conference of the parties run

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January 11th to the 22nd, 2027,
at UN headquarters in New York.

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So that's the meeting where the
leftover fights actually get resolved.

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So everything that didn't get through
or needed to be passed that couldn't

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get passed on the resolution they'll be
going toe to toe on that for a while.

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00:13:35,604 --> 00:13:39,131
Now, some of the things that did come out
of that meeting in March and April, was

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that terms of reference for the treaty's
subsidiary scientific and technical

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00:13:42,944 --> 00:13:47,167
panels and an agreement to build a
prototype clearing house mechanism

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that shared data system, basically,
including protections for how indigenous

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traditional knowledge is handled in it.

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That's ahead of the COP1.

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So there's still some things that are
heading in that are still unresolved in

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00:13:58,091 --> 00:14:01,751
COP1, is like how much money wealthier
countries are obligated to put in, and

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how contributions are capped, and then
how Article 18's area-based management

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00:14:06,317 --> 00:14:10,817
tools, the actual process for designation
of high seas marine protected area

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00:14:10,867 --> 00:14:14,237
that'll handle individual countries'
sovereignty concerns, of course.

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00:14:14,354 --> 00:14:18,014
Who gets observer status at meetings
and on what terms, and who hosts

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00:14:18,014 --> 00:14:21,574
the treaty's secretariat, with
Belgium, Chile, and China all bidding

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00:14:21,574 --> 00:14:23,564
on a decision deferred to COP1.

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00:14:23,584 --> 00:14:28,194
So all these things are gonna be decided
in COP1, or at least discussed in COP1.

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00:14:28,581 --> 00:14:30,061
We don't know if they're
gonna get decided.

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It's kind of a cool thing to live through.

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00:14:33,619 --> 00:14:37,459
Over the last 20 years, we've seen
negotiations really start with, " Hey,

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00:14:37,459 --> 00:14:38,899
maybe we should do something about this.

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00:14:38,899 --> 00:14:40,903
We should look into this,"
to, "Oh, let's, start getting

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00:14:40,913 --> 00:14:43,066
something going," in the mid-2010s.

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00:14:43,066 --> 00:14:45,826
And then as we get into the early
2020s, we have an agreement.

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00:14:46,016 --> 00:14:48,176
Like, first it failed,
then we got an agreement.

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00:14:48,413 --> 00:14:51,693
This goes to show how hard it is to
negotiate these types of international

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00:14:51,693 --> 00:14:53,283
agreements, but it's possible.

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00:14:53,649 --> 00:14:55,679
Countries could come together and do it.

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And it's a matter of like, hey, this
first one, like if I look at this landmark

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00:15:00,429 --> 00:15:02,664
treaty, It's not perfect by any means.

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00:15:02,664 --> 00:15:04,894
When I first looked at it, I'm like,
"Oh, there's a lot of loopholes."

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00:15:05,321 --> 00:15:06,201
But it's a beginning.

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It's a beginning that we need.

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00:15:07,721 --> 00:15:10,491
We need the countries to
agree that we can do this.

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00:15:10,871 --> 00:15:13,924
Now that it's agreed to
and ratified, now we build.

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Now the work starts.

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We just started getting it going.

311
00:15:16,467 --> 00:15:17,477
Let's see how this works.

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00:15:17,477 --> 00:15:20,347
Maybe get a marine protected
area in or get all that solved.

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00:15:20,347 --> 00:15:21,297
There's a lot to go into.

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00:15:21,297 --> 00:15:23,877
It's not just now we're gonna designate
a bunch of marine protected areas.

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00:15:24,227 --> 00:15:27,307
I'm sure that'll happen at times,
and I'm sure there are sites that

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00:15:27,307 --> 00:15:31,467
have been designated as priority
sites that need to be protected.

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00:15:31,854 --> 00:15:35,994
And so once it does go through, once they
solve all the nuances around that, or

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00:15:35,994 --> 00:15:39,584
most of them, those will be proposed,
and they will be discussed, and they will

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00:15:39,584 --> 00:15:44,901
be fought over by words and in these
windowless rooms for 36 hours at a time.

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00:15:44,931 --> 00:15:48,477
And hopefully by the end of that time,
there'll be something that comes out

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00:15:48,477 --> 00:15:53,467
that's binding, that is a boundary on
paper and enforceable on the water.

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00:15:53,901 --> 00:15:55,871
And I think that is really cool.

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00:15:56,134 --> 00:16:01,331
And to see how negotiators reacted when
the gavel finally went down, that was

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00:16:01,331 --> 00:16:04,311
something that, it got me emotional,
and I'm not even a policy person.

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00:16:04,644 --> 00:16:07,484
It's just to think about that countries
around the world came together

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00:16:07,484 --> 00:16:10,514
and agreed on a certain number of
measures, and these pillars are pretty

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00:16:10,514 --> 00:16:12,834
important that I went through, these
four pillars, where they agree that

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00:16:12,834 --> 00:16:15,514
this is what needs to be done in the
future, and they actually got it done.

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00:16:15,874 --> 00:16:17,951
And it's not perfect, but
it's something to start with.

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00:16:18,554 --> 00:16:20,184
So that's the episode for today.

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I would love to hear your
thoughts on this whole process.

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00:16:23,331 --> 00:16:23,831
How do you think?

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00:16:23,841 --> 00:16:25,101
Do you think it should've gone faster?

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00:16:25,111 --> 00:16:26,521
What do you think could
help in the future?

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00:16:26,711 --> 00:16:27,771
I would love to hear your thoughts.

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00:16:27,791 --> 00:16:29,941
If you're on Spotify,
hit me up in a comment.

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00:16:29,961 --> 00:16:30,861
Love to hear from you.

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00:16:31,067 --> 00:16:34,534
If you want to hit me up on
Instagram or TikTok or Facebook

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00:16:34,534 --> 00:16:35,694
or whatever, you can do that.

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00:16:35,694 --> 00:16:36,804
The links are in the show notes.

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00:16:36,981 --> 00:16:39,641
But I wanna thank you so much for
joining me on today's episode of the

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00:16:39,641 --> 00:16:40,821
How to Protect the Ocean podcast.

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00:16:41,024 --> 00:16:44,674
Tomorrow, we're gonna be talking about
seafood and seafood labels and how you

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00:16:44,674 --> 00:16:48,634
as a consumer can really drive what
retailers do, especially when we have

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00:16:48,644 --> 00:16:52,074
the infrastructure at the top and the
policies at the top, and the organization

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00:16:52,074 --> 00:16:54,514
is ready to certify sustainable seafood.

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00:16:54,644 --> 00:16:55,794
So we're gonna talk about that tomorrow.

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00:16:55,934 --> 00:16:56,574
Don't miss it.

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00:16:56,694 --> 00:16:59,214
This has been another episode of the
How to Protect the Ocean podcast.

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00:16:59,234 --> 00:17:00,194
I'm your host, Andrew Lewin.

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00:17:00,311 --> 00:17:00,901
Have a great day.

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00:17:00,901 --> 00:17:02,871
We'll talk to you next time,
and happy conservation.