Between the COP21 and the COP22, the Ocean and Climate platform activities

The Ocean and Climate Platform supported the organization of the international World Ocean and Climate Day on June 8, 2015, or World Oceans Day. At UNESCO, the participation of scientists, international organizations and high-level politicians as well as the mobilization for the Ocean’s Call for Climate caught the attention of the media, the general public and the scientific community concerning Ocean and Climate issues. At this occasion, in COP21’s civil society zone, Laurent Fabius, President of COP21, announced his commitment to the integration of the ocean. In 2016, the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission – UNESCO and the Ocean and Climate Platform organized, for the third consecutive year, a day dedicated to Ocean and Climate during the World Oceans Day at UNESCO.
Ocean for Climate Days during COP21
Ocean Session during the Action WeekThe Ocean and Climate Platform co-organized an Ocean session, hosted by France as part of the resilience day organized by Peru, which pointed out the most flourishing civil society initiatives to increase ocean resilience towards climate change. In 2016, the Ocean and Climate Platform will push forward the ocean session of the Action Agenda. The OCP will push forward its action for the ocean in the Action agenda to be launched during COP22 in Marrakech.

Oceans Day and Ocean and Climate Forum For the first time in the history of climate COP, the ocean found a place at the heart of the civil society in COP21 Generation Climate Areas. The Ocean and Climate Forum, organized by the Ocean and Climate Platform, the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission – UNESCO and the Global Ocean Forum brought together scientists, economic stakeholders, civil society representatives, high-level international public decision-makers and youth representatives to discuss the connections between the ocean and climate. Over 500 people present and 300 people via streaming, mostly ocean specialists, attended this Forum hosted by Ségolène Royal, Minister of Ecology, Sustainable Development and Energy. This forum was followed by other conferences, film screenings and diverse events, which attracted a large public. As it has previously done in 2015, the Ocean and Climate Platform will organize an Ocean and Climate Forum and will join the Global Ocean Forum’s Ocean Days initiative during COP22 in Morocco, in collaboration with IOC-UNESCO.
June 8th and the Ocean for Climate Days will become an international must for ocean and climate issues relayed on the web at the international level.

The Platform Scientific Committee and scientific network have provided scientific synthesis material (17 scientific notes) addressed to decision-makers on ocean and climate issues. The areas identified by the Platform Scientific Committee and international scientific network will complete the areas identified in 2015. They also contributed to both the argumentation for a special report on the ocean from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which decided in the IPCC43 to draft a Special Report on climate change, oceans and cryosphere, and the scientific approval of the advocacy.

The Youth for Ocean (YO) group was created within the Franco-Ameri-Can Climate Talks (FACTs) framework, organized by the French Embassies in the United States and in Canada, in preparation for COP21. This interdisciplinary and international group of young scientists promotes the links between ocean and climate with three objectives:
providing an innovative and proactive perspective on the links between climate change, ocean and societies; promoting a dialogue between science and society by sharing their results and reflections; seeking a better integration of the ocean in international climate negotiations.They will present their results during the Ocean for Climate Days at COP22.Platform Advocacy 

The Platform advocacy conveyed the vision of a healthy ocean for a protected climate. This was organized around 9 recommendations focusing on the need for the development of ocean and climate science, a good management of ecosystems, the importance of economic solutions for mitigation and adaptation, and the funding necessity oriented toward the ocean. Parts of these recommendations have been integrated in the Paris Agreement and the Lima-Paris Actions Plan.

On shipping, the Ocean and Climate Platform shall formulate a collective influential strategy, in support to that deployed by each member organization, in order to promote maritime transportation as part of the solution and to improve all the tools (International Maritime Organization regulations, technology and training) available to reduce ship induced greenhouse gas emissions.
On Nature-based solutions, the OCP will prove that the ocean, as an ecosystem, is a solution to mitigation and adaptation.

30 000 persons have signed the Ocean’s call for Climate which was launched on June 8, 2015 and ended at the end of COP21.

The need for a solid scientific basis The Scientific Committee has created a solid foundation with the production of high quality scientific notes, which reinforced the Platform’s credibility. Members of the Scientific Committee have worked in an interdisciplinary fashion in order to explain the issues to an informed, yet non-specialized public. Moreover, while developing the policy, the Scientific Committee contributed with its expertise in the field of science, and an argumentation for an IPCC special report on the ocean. Lastly, the Scientific Committee collaborated with the knowledge dissemination group in order to help define issues to present to the general public. Hence, Science guided the entire production of the Platform.

The power of a large coalition of actors joining their forces The June 8, 2015 international conference, World Oceans Day at UNESCO, the international mobilization for ocean and climate in the civil society zone at COP21 and the ocean session as part of the Lima-Paris Actions Plan have highlighted ocean and climate issues for the countries involved in the negotiations. The mobilization and communication conducted by members have reinforced the message aimed towards a very diverse audience (States and regions, socio-economic decision-makers, research, non-profit stakeholders and the general public). Between the Climate March in September 2014 and the end of COP21, a dozen mobilization projects have led to hundreds of initiatives in connection with ocean and climate thus permitting the relay of Platform messages.