‘Healthy Oceans, Healthy Planet’ – World Oceans Day 2016

8 June 2016 is World Oceans Day. The 2016 theme for World Oceans Day is ‘Healthy Oceans, Healthy Planet’. This is a timely theme. The world’s oceans are facing a range of threats: uncontrolled exploitation of marine living resources, increased biophysical variability and change linked to global climate variability and change, impacts of terrestrial development, and of course an increasing population dependent on the seas and oceans for food security and livelihoods.

World Oceans Day was initially proposed during the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. Non-governmental groups and civil society organisations celebrated early ocean days and in December 2008 the United Nations General Assembly ‘resolved that, as from 2009, the United Nations will designate 8 June as World Oceans Day’ (UNGA 2008, 63/111, para 171).

World Oceans Day has increased its salience in recent years. It serves as a focal point to review, reflect and respond to the challenges facing the coasts, seas and oceans of the ‘blue planet’. In this issue of the Australian Journal of Maritime and Ocean Affairs the various contributors highlight the range of issues that currently impact on ocean and coastal management, maritime operations and marine activities.

Dirhamsyah’s paper, ‘Setbacks in the Development of Marine Protected Areas in Indonesia’, provides an important analysis of the development of marine protected areas and marine resources management in Indonesia, noting key challenges with the legislative framework and institutional arrangements.

Local government responses to climate change impacts and sea-level rise are key to adaptation in the coastal zone. Beverley Clarke, Selina Tually and Michael Scott’s paper, ‘Social Networks and Decision-making for Coastal Land-use Planning, Development and Adaptation Response’, provides case study from metropolitan Adelaide, South Australia, to examine how an urban coastal development deemed susceptible to coastal hazards was approved.

Eldene O’Shea’s paper, ‘Changes in Habitat Preference of Tuna Species and Implication for Regional Fisheries Management: Southern Bluefin Tuna Fishing in the Indian Ocean’, examines the potential impacts of changes in the ocean’s physical environment and ecosystems on management of southern bluefin tuna (Thunnus maccoyii), a species of low population abundance that is the focus of a high-value fishery.

The Gulf of Guinea (GoG) has emerged as the new hotspot of piracy and armed robbery against ships. Samuel Oyewole examines the efforts to combat piracy in the GoG in the paper ‘Suppressing Maritime Piracy in the Gulf of Guinea: The Prospects and Challenges of the Regional Players’. This paper outlines achievements so far and challenges encountered and suggests possible ways forward.

Isaiah Okorie’s paper, ‘Are Current Port Liability Provisions in International Maritime Law Adequate in an Era of Automation?’, explores how extant international maritime law rules on port operations hold up in automated ports. The paper examines the consequence of rapid growth of automation in ports in terms and the response of consensus-driven international legal norms and rules for ports.

The papers in this issue highlight key issue areas, challenges and solutions that in different ways address the themes raised by World Oceans Day. The contributors provide interesting insights into the range of challenges faced in developing and maintaining healthy oceans and a healthy, ‘blue’, ocean-focused planet.