EU to allocate more than €300 million for ocean conservation efforts

At the Our Ocean Conference, held April 28-30, 2025 in Busan, the EU pledged more than €300 million for the oceans, particularly to support sustainable blue economy activities, to reduce marine pollution, strengthen marine protected areas, develop digital oceans, sustainable fisheries, and oceans and climate change.

Our Ocean Conference

The Our Ocean Conference is an international event, launched in 2014 and organized by a different country each time. Its goal is to support global ocean governance and activities that enhance marine conservation and promote sustainable development.

This year’s conference, held in Busan, was an opportunity to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the first meeting and to showcase the achievements and best practices resulting from the voluntary commitments made by the global ocean community over the past decade. The conference was held under the theme Digital Oceans.

The Our Ocean Conference aims to intensify joint efforts to solve today’s problems. It brings together countries around the world, civil society and industry to inspire and put forward ambitious commitments to protect the oceans. Since 2014, it has mobilized more than 2,618 commitments worth more than €140 billion.

At the previous edition of this event, held in Greece, the Union made 40 commitments for 2024, with a total value of 3.5 billion euros, and you can read about the details in an earlier article in Water Matters: Protecting the oceans – the EU will commit more than €3.5 billion to new measures.

EU’s ocean conservation efforts

The European Union is involved in the following activities to protect the oceans:

Sustainable blue economy:

• 120 million euros to help African and Pacific countries strengthen ocean governance and develop the blue economy in a sustainable way. This corresponds to 58 million euros for the western Indian Ocean and 42 million euros for Central Africa and 20 million euros for the Pacific.

Marine pollution:

• 65.5 million euros to combat marine pollution. The funds will be distributed as follows: 18 million euros to develop a comprehensive European strategy for assessing and monitoring aquatic waste; 43.5 million euros to support authorities in eliminating pollution and transitioning to a more climate-neutral blue circular economy; and 4 million euros in technical assistance to support 50 communities in preparing transformation programs, stimulating local change and promoting sustainable practices.

Marine Protected Areas:

• 40 million to support partner countries in their efforts to protect and sustainably manage marine biodiversity areas and to quickly ratify the agreement Going Beyond National Jurisdiction.

Digital Oceans:

• 30 million euros have been earmarked for the creation of a digital twin ocean.

Sustainable fisheries:

• 2.5 million to support the implementation of the Port State Measures Agreement (PSMA) to effectively combat illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing.

Oceans and climate change:

• 985,000 euros to strengthen the International Platform for Ocean Sustainability (IPOS) to enhance scientific and policy knowledge sharing and stimulate informed decision-making on ocean conservation.

European Pact for the Oceans

The EU is taking many steps to protect the oceans at the EU and international levels. The oceans continue to be considered a priority under the current term of the European Commission, as you can read in detail in a previous article: EC Work Program 2025. The European Commission will soon adopt a European Pact for the Oceans. It will create a single policy framework to protect the health of the oceans and boost the EU’s blue economy.

As announced, the European Commission intends to present the pact at the third UN High-Level Conference on Oceans, to be held in Nice, France, in June 2025, to set an example of the Union’s global leadership in this field. For more information on the European Commission’s current activities, visit the International Ocean Governance website.

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