See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/348389145

THE SCIENCE WE NEED FOR THE OCEAN WE WANT

Article · July 2020

CITATIONS READS

0 203

12 authors, including:

Tune Usha Sisir Kumar Dash

Ministry of Earth Sciences Ministry of Earth Sciences
36 PUBLICATIONS 532 CITATIONS 33 PUBLICATIONS 182 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE

Iyyappan Muthukumarasamy Vivek Ganesh

India Meteorological Department Azim Premji University
15 PUBLICATIONS 49 CITATIONS 15 PUBLICATIONS 67 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE

All content following this page was uploaded by Iyyappan Muthukumarasamy on 11 January 2021.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

OCEAN DIGEST
Quarterly Newsletter of the Ocean Society of India
Volume 7 | Issue 3 | July 2020 | ISSN 2394-1928
Ocean Digest Quarterly Newsletter of the Ocean Society of India

THE SCIENCE WE NEED FOR The Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission

of UNESCO (IOC/UNESCO) was tasked to coordinate the
THE OCEAN WE WANT Decade's preparatory process (2018-2020). This involved
inviting the global ocean community to jointly prepare an
Tune Usha1, S. K. Dash1, M.Iyyappan1, G. Vivek1, R implementation plan for the Decade in ocean science and
1 2 2
Karthika , S. Ramsundar , Jossia Joseph , technology to deliver, together, the ocean we need for the
2 2
B.K. Jena , Vijaya Ravichandran , R.Venkatesan ,
2 future we want. This Implementation Plan will be submitted
1
M.V.Ramanamurthy , M.A. Atmanand* 2 for approval to the 75th session of the UNGA in autumn 2020.
Global and regional consultative workshops are
1 essential mechanisms in the Decade design process to achieve
National Centre Coastal Research, Chennai, India; the objectives and to engage various communities through a
2
National Institute of Ocean Technology, Chennai, multi-stakeholder process and structured dialogues. The first
India;*IOC Regional Committee for the Central Indian Global Planning Meeting held in Copenhagen, 13-15 May
Ocean (IOCINDIO), Member Executive Planning 2019, brought all key stakeholders interested in the Decade to
the same level of information. Following this first global
Group, UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainability planning meeting, a series of regional workshops were
& Former Director, National Institute of Ocean planned to identify regional specific priorities and
Technology, India requirements as well as contributions to global objectives. It is
in this connection the Regional Planning Workshop for the
1.0 Background Northern/Central Indian Ocean countries as well as ROPME
Sea was held at NIOT during January 8-10, 2020.
The United Nations has proclaimed a Decade of
2.0 Regional Planning Workshop for the Northern/
Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021- Central Indian Ocean countries as well as ROPME sea
2030) (https://oceandecade.org/)to support efforts to area
reverse the cycle of decline in ocean health and gather The Regional Planning Workshop for the
ocean stakeholders worldwide behind a common Northern/Central Indian Ocean countries as well as ROPME
framework that will ensure ocean science can fully sea area was conducted by the Ministry of Earth Sciences,
support countries in creating improved conditions for Govt. of India in the National Institute of Ocean Technology, th
sustainable development of the Oceans. The term Chennai,
th
located in the southern part of India between the 8 -
'Sustainable Development of Oceans' refers to the 10 January 2020 to identify the region-specific priorities,
sustainable development of the ocean, seas, and coasts. requirement and contribution to the objectives of the UN
The main principle is that the Decade should utilize a decade of Ocean Sciences for sustainable development. The
multi-disciplinary understanding of ocean processes and agenda for the three-day workshop had an inaugural session
followed by well-structured panel discussions comprising of
solution-oriented research to generate new knowledge to experts identified across six working group followed by group
support societal actors in reducing pressures on the discussions and a final wrap up with the summary and
ocean, preserving and restoring ocean ecosystems, and recommendation of each working group. As a prelude, an
safeguarding ocean-related prosperity for generations to Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission regional
come. The identified six societal outcomes are: committee for The Central Indian Ocean (IOCINDIO)
· A clean ocean whereby sources of pollution are leadership workshop on developing the regional framework
identified, quantified, and reduced andpollutants for coastal Vulnerability was held from January 6-7, 2020.
removed from the ocean. 3.0 Inaugural Session
Dr. M.A. Atmanand welcomed the delegates and gave
· A healthy and resilient ocean whereby marine a summary of the Global Planning meeting held at
ecosystems are mapped and protected, multiple impacts, Copenhagen and on the activities of the National Institute of
including climate change, are measured and reduced, and Technology. Dr. Justin Ahanhanzo, IOC, spoke on the genesis
the provision of ocean ecosystem services are and overview of the UN Decade. Dr. Vladimir Ryabinin,
maintained. Executive Secretary, IOC, talked about the importance of the
· A predicted ocean whereby society has the capacity to UN Decade and gave an overview of the various plans to be
understand current and future ocean conditions forecast taken forward (through video conference). Dr. Ariel Troisi,
Chairperson, IOC, highlighted the importance of the Ocean
their change, and impact on human well being and decade and gave an overall action plan (through video
livelihoods. conference). Dr. M. Rajeevan, Secretary, MoES, reiterated the
· A safe ocean whereby human communities are commitment of India to the various SDG goals and the UN
protected from ocean hazards and where the safety of decade action plan (through video conference). Dr. Karen
operations at sea and on the coast is ensured. Evans, EPG, IOC, highlighted the draft science plan for UN
Decade. She highlighted the cross-cutting and inter-
· A sustainably harvested and productive ocean connections between the various science themes. Dr.Sateesh
ensuring the provision of food supply and alternative C. Shenoi, Vice-Chair, IOC, gave the Keynote address. In his
livelihoods. address, he highlighted six major issues viz. Climate
· A transparent and accessible ocean whereby all Change–Sea Level Rise, de-oxygenated ocean (BoB, Arabian
nations, stakeholders, and citizens have access to ocean Sea), Ocean acidification, exploitation of living and non-
data and information, technologies and has the capacities living resources, marine biodiversity, marine pollution,
to inform their decisions. particularly plastics and risks. Dr. M.V. RamanaMurthy,
Director, National Centre for Coastal Research (NCCR), gave
the Vote of Thanks.
9
 Volume 7, Issue 3, July 2020

About 100 delegated from the various IOCINDIO Member 4.0 Some of the major recommendations of each
States including Australia, Bangladesh, France, India, Kuwait, working group are as follows:
Maldives, Saudi Arabia, UK, participated; SACEP countries WG-I on Clean Oceans recommended for
collection of litter before it enters the marine system, and
was represented by the Director General, SACEP; IOC-EPG
recycling of plastic waste, awareness on the usefulness
members from Australia and Russia, NOAA-USA, IOC- of change in the public perceptions towards plastic use,
Africa also participated in the three-day workshop. The developing and implementing a proper plan for disposal
participants were well-represented form all concerned sectors, of the marine litter collected during the beach clean-up
including Government organisations, academia, research operations.
institutes, etc. and about 23% were women delegates. WG-II on Healthy and Resilient Ocean has
stressed the need to identify the boundary between
healthy and unhealthy ecosystems and the drivers
affecting the ecosystems' health and environment,
including invasive species, bio-fouling, and the
restoration steps needed to improve the health and
resilience of oceans. The involvement of local
communities in resource conservation, the use of local
knowledge for protection and conservation of resources,
and promoting ecosystem value services have all been
identified as priority areas for a healthy and resilient
Inaugural Session
ocean.
WG-III on Predicted Oceans have
recommended the establishment of a data hub for the
mid-eastern region under the IOCINDIO platform. In
addition, an ocean prediction science team to be formed
and a regional forum established to address all the issues
related to the predictive ocean.
WG-IV on Safe Oceans, major points that
emerged during the discussion includes mitigation or
elimination of risk by developing proper models for risk
assessment for operations at sea and a comprehensive
coastal vulnerability assessment and efforts to minimize
Delegates and Invitees to the Workshop or eliminate false alarms about a possible extreme event.
WG-V on the Sustainably harvested and
4.0 Working Groups productive ocean has identified the need to develop a
To steer the deliberations in the right direction, six working working concept that brings together the modes and
groups and panel members were identified, and detailed means to enhance economic benefits and coastal
deliberations were held. The six working groups were: livelihoods by sustainably harnessing the marine
· WG-I: Clean Oceans resources through capture fisheries and through
· WG-II: Healthy and Resilient Ocean responsible mariculture.
· WG-III: Predicted Oceans WG-VI on Transparent and Accessible Ocean,
the major recommendations were that data and
· WG-IV: Safe oceans
information goals should be user-driven, and the ocean
· WG-V: A sustainably harvested and productive ocean science community needs an accessible data
· WG-VI: A Transparent and Accessible Ocean system/portal to deliver data and info and should be
coupled with an internationally developed and
recognized data policy.
As part of IOCINDIO–IOCAFRICA
collaboration initiation, interactions were held with
participants from Cameroon and Ghana. A coastal
vulnerability capacity building program is being
initiated with IOCAFRICA through Kuwait,
Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia, and India. Participants from
Bangladesh and India are expected to participate at the
regional UN Decade planning workshop to be held at
Nairobi during the month-end. A session was organized
by Dr. Jay Pearlman (over Skype) and Drs. Sidney
Thurston and R Venkatesan on ocean best practices,
Working Group deliberations in progress which is to be taken care of during all observations

10
Ocean Digest Quarterly Newsletter of the Ocean Society of India

planned during the Decade. A session by Early Career Research Highlights

Ocean Professionals (ECOPS) involved an exclusive
interaction with the students' community, and about 80 Bay of Bengal Sea surface salinity
students participated actively and interacted with variability using a decade of improved
Scientists/mentors from various countries.
5.0 Major Outcome and recommendations
SMOS re-processing
The major recommendations from this region for Temperature and salinity are the most important
the UN Decade for Ocean Science for Sustainability are: physical parameters of the ocean. Ocean temperature is
considered as the flywheel of weather and climate, and
• To develop a Regional Framework for Coastal
due to its importance scientists started monitoring ocean
Vulnerability towards the Safety, Security, and
surface temperature from space way back from1960's.
Sustainable Development of Member States in the
But the ocean salinity an equally important physical
Indian Ocean.
parameter, which can control ocean temperature, ocean
• Monitoring and Management of Marine litter and dynamics and productivity was really a challenge to
research on microplastics monitor from space. This issue was overcome by the
• Tsunami Early Warning in the Indian Ocean. launch of SMOS (Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity)
• Inventory with knowledge gaps in existing satellite by European Space Agency (ESA) on 2
programmes, studies, and researches maximizing November 2009 and AQUARIUS (SAC-D) and SMAP
their wide and equitable usage towards the UN satellites by NASA (National Aeronautics and Space
Decade success. Administration) on 10 June 2011 and 31 January 2015
• Establishment of the Indian Ocean Youth respectively. These satellites are capable to provide
Leadership Network of Ocean, Climate and global maps of ocean surface salinity every 8-10 days at
Atmospheric Scientists and Professionals. 25km spatial resolution. But these satellites have
• Establishment of Indian Ocean Leadership difficulty in monitoring salinity near the coast due to
Mentoring Network. potential contamination from land and radio frequency
interferences linked to artificial sources. Hence, the first
• Progress Review Follow up of the attempts to estimate surface salinity over land locked
Recommendations at the IIOE-2-2020 Meeting in areas and relatively low salinity regions were
Goa, India, March 2020. unsuccessful because of a sub-optimal processing of
T h e R e g i o n a l P l a n n i n g Wo r k s h o p f o r t h e systematic errors and too stringent quality control in the
Northern/Central Indian Ocean countries as well as dataset. But recently a large improvement has been made
ROPME sea area provided an excellent platform for on the data retrieval algorithms.
bringing together experts and stakeholders related to
various aspects of the coastal and ocean science and
technology to deliberate and identify the region-specific
priorities, requirement, and contribution to the global
ocean science needed to support the sustainable
development of our shared ocean.
6.0 Way Forward
Presently, the draft Implementation Plan (Version 2.0) of
the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for
Sustainable Development, together with a summary
version of the Plan has been finalised, taking into account
the many valuable comments and feedback gathered from
the member countries through the regional workshops held
in different parts of the world. In keeping with UNGA
Resolution 74/19, Version 2.0 of the Plan has been
submitted to the UN Division for Ocean Affairs and the
Law of the Sea (DOALOS) in advance of the seventy-fifth
session of the General Assembly of the United Nations.
Acknowledgment
The authors gratefully acknowledge the support
extended by Dr. Vladimir Ryabinin, Executive Secretary,
IOC, and Dr. Justin Ahanhanzo, IOC, Dr.M. Rajeevan,
Secretary, MoES, and the financial support extended by
the Ministry of Earth Sciences, Govt. of India for the
conduct of the Regional Planning Workshop for the
Northern/Central Indian Ocean countries as well as
ROPME sea area. This workshop has paved the way for Fig. 1 Sep to Nov (SON) average map of (a, b) World Ocean Data
initiating a number of programs that would contribute to (WOD) sea surface salinity (SSS), (c, d) SMAP SSS (colour) and
GEKCO currents (vector), (e, f) SMOS-new SSS (colour) and GEKCO
the UN decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable currents (vector) for (1st column) 2015 and (2nd column) 2016.
Development (2021-2030). Locations of Ganges-Brahmaputra (GB) and Irrawaddy (IRR) estuaries,
the two main rivers in to the Bay of Bengal, are marked on the panels
11 View publication stats