News

From 27 to 30 March 2022, UNESCO undertook a pilot environmental DNA (eDNA) sampling campaign in the Gulf of Porto: Calanche of Piana, Gulf of Girolata, Scandola Reserve World Heritage site (France), to prepare the global roll-out of its citizen science eDNA initiative.

The Dialogues with Industry is a forum for compact and meaningful dialogue with new and established companies, academia and government to highlight opportunities for the public and private sectors to work in partnership towards achieving a mature, vibrant ocean observing enterprise for a sustainable blue economy.

The latest UNESCO announcement on the endorsement of new UN Ocean Decade actions was great news to several projects under the GOOS UN Ocean Decade programmes - and many more initiatives are well underway in the process.

Rolling out its Tsunami Ready Recognition Programme (IOC-UNESCO TRRP), UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission hosted a Tsunami Ready Mapping Workshop in Bridgetown, Barbados 8-12 August 2022, and co-organized a series of community, national and partner engagement activities.

During the week of 22 August 2022, the First IODE Steering Group meeting for the Ocean Data Information System and the Third IODE Steering Group meeting for the Ocean Infohub Project took place at the UNESCO/IOC Project Office for IODE in Oostende, Belgium. 

The Ocean Agency, UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, and the City of Geneva, have brought the Ocean Decade Exhibition to Geneva thanks to the support of the exhibition’s creativity partner, Adobe. The Exhibition will run until 5 September 2022 at Rotonde du Mont-Blanc.  

The 2022 UN Ocean Conference in Lisbon made significant progress in the arduous battle against the ocean emergency. UNESCO through its IOC project office at its Regional Bureau for Science and Culture in Europe has had a crucial role in advocating for ocean sustainability and ocean literacy and so was put forward in 3 official events, namely, the Ocean Literacy Dialogues, the second edition of SEA BEYOND finals, conducted in partnership with the Prada Group, and ultimately, the Blue Curriculum: a training session event.

A new initiative by UNESCO and the Indonesian agency for Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics (BMKG), documents the story of survivors and eyewitnesses of the 4th May 2000 Tsunami in Banggai, Indonesia.

David Pugh - ocean scientist and former Chair of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO (2003-2007) - passed away on 1 August 2022 leaving behind great accomplishments and discoveries in physical oceanography.