The international conference will be hosted by the UNESCO Regional Bureau for Science and Culture in Europe with the financial support of the Swedish Ministry of the Environment and Energy. It will be honoured by the presence of Gesine Meissner, Member of the European Parliament; Peter Thomson, UN Special Envoy for the Ocean; Barbara Degani, Vice-Minister of the Environment and Protection of Land and Sea of Italy; Vladimir Ryabinin, Executive Secretary of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO; and, Francesca von Habsburg, Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary.

The conference will discuss topics covered by the UNESCO Ocean Literacy for All voluntary commitment to the June 2017 UN Ocean Conference; develop an Ocean Literacy for All road map for the next 3 years, in preparation for the next UN Ocean Conference; and, debate ways and means by which the Ocean Literacy for All initiative will best support the UN's Sustainable Development Goal 14 and develop in tune with the proposed International Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030) - the ocean we need for the future, a voluntary commitment by UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission.