Source: ECO (CBD Alliance)
Authors: Matthew Gianni (Deep Sea Conservation Coalition) & Helena Paul (EcoNexus)
The deep-sea has been described by the United Nations First World Ocean Assessment, published in 2016, as a vast realm which “constitutes the largest source of species and ecosystem diversity on Earth” and that the diversity of organisms in the deep sea supports ecosystem processes necessary for the Earth’s natural systems to function.
At the same time, there is increasing interest on the part of a number of countries and companies to begin mining the deep ocean for metals such as cobalt, copper, nickel, gold, silver and rare earths. Much of this interest is focused on mineral deposits in areas of the world’s deep ocean seabed which lie beyond the jurisdiction of individual nations, an area covering over a third of the surface of the planet.
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