Madam Secretary-General of the International Seabed Authority, Leticia Carvalho, shares a special message to celebrate World Oceans Day 2026:
“This year’s theme asks us to REIMAGINE.
To reimagine a new relationship with our ocean. A relationship that moves from “passive inheritors of the ocean’s generosity to active guardians of its future.”
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In the context of the International Seabed Authority, this aspiration began in 1967, when Maltese diplomat Arvid Pardo stood before the United Nations and asked the world to consider the deep seabed and its mineral resources.
Not as a frontier to be claimed, but as a global commons that belongs in equal measure to every person, nation, and future generation.
Deeming it the common heritage of humankind, Pardo’s vision gave birth to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and to the ISA.
Today, the “Area,” the seabed beyond national jurisdiction, covers 54 percent of the world’s oceans.
This Area belongs to no single nation or deep pocketed interests. The Convention requires it to be managed responsibly, sustainably and with equity and the protection of the marine environment at the heart of decision making.
The ISA, with 171 Member States and the European Union, is the sole institution mandated to govern the Area, for the benefit of all humanity, not for the benefit of the few.
However, the ISA is not solely an institution focused on regulating deep-sea mining.
Above all, the ISA is an institution of holistic ocean governance: legal, environmental, scientific, economic, and multilateral.
This breadth of purpose is what the moment demands we commit to.
The ISA has established 31 exploration contracts, each subject to rigorous legal standards and environmental baselines.
Under the Common Heritage principle, any financial benefits from future activities must be shared equitably, with developing States receiving preferential consideration. This is not a courtesy, it is a legal right.
ISA has permanently protected nearly 2 million square kilometres of seabed, before a single commercial operation has ever been approved. And this will increase as more Regional Environmental Management Plans are developed.
Since 2001, our Contractors have supported 255 research cruises, and invested over USD $2 billion dollars in exploration, including $413 million dollars dedicated to environmental studies.
Our global deep-sea database holds more than 200,000 species observations.
No commercial operation has yet been approved.
This is governance working exactly as it was designed to.
The framework is being built to ensure that if operations are ever approved, they are done right.
Colleagues, the multilateral framework cannot be taken for granted.
Today, unilateral actors are challenging the rules and norms that took decades to build. The decisions being taken now will determine whether the common heritage principle remains an operative legal commitment, or whether it yields to the interests of the most powerful.
Therefore, reimagining our relationship with the ocean also means reimagining how we govern it: through building understanding, scientific endeavor and technological advancement– all moving in leaps and bounds as human ingenuity progresses– and the will to ensure that our framework lives up to its aspiration.
The BBNJ Agreement and the work of the ISA share the same conviction: that the ocean beyond national jurisdiction must be guarded, holistically and sustainably, anchored in evidence.
This is the work of rules-based governance. And it is the work the Authority was built to lead on behalf of the deep seabed.
Happy World Oceans Day.”