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Global Call for Adopting ‘Blue Finance’ to Support Sea Life Sustainability

Global calls increase to adopt sustainable financial tools (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Global calls increase to adopt sustainable financial tools (Asharq Al-Awsat)
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Global Call for Adopting ‘Blue Finance’ to Support Sea Life Sustainability

Global calls increase to adopt sustainable financial tools (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Global calls increase to adopt sustainable financial tools (Asharq Al-Awsat)

An international report stressed the importance of blue finance to support the sustainability of marine life, beaches, and oceans.

Richard Attias Foundation issued a report on the need to engage the private finance, business, and investment community to protect the oceans and create a healthy future.

A significant milestone was reached two weeks ago when five key international institutions announced they would consolidate their efforts into a joint global guidance document to help with global market consistency and transparency.

An appreciable share of the ocean and water-related projects are currently included under the mantle of sustainable bonds.

It is also clear that an instrument tailored explicitly to deploying capital towards the blue economy will help accelerate and track investment while creating stronger linkages between investment and industry performance against the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The founding president of the World Ocean Council, Paul Holthus, called for exploring how to mobilize private sector financing for the oceans.

The report indicated that just 1.6 percent of overseas development aid goes towards the 14th SDG life below water.

SDG 14 is also the least funded of all the SDGs, both from an ODA and philanthropic point of view.

“While the recent $1 billion pledge to scale up philanthropic funding for the oceans is a welcome boost, it will not be enough to mobilize the $175 billion we need annually to deliver on SDG 14.”

According to the report, blue bonds offer a promising avenue to close the financial gap.

Seychelles initiated these tools in 2018 as a sovereign blue bond to help direct capital towards protecting marine resources and developing the maritime economy.

Since then, they’ve been issued by corporate and multilateral issuers, from Bank of China’s $961 million blue bonds to finance marine-related projects to the Asian Development Bank’s $151 million bond as part of its $5 billion action plan for healthy oceans in the region.

The argument for blue finance is that projects that improve water resources' health and sustainability deliver substantial economic value, given the central place of water in the world economy and the livelihoods of millions.

“One marine protection scheme in Mexico’s Baja peninsula, for instance, led to a 400 percent increase in fish stocks within a decade, reversing the toll of decades of overfishing,” read the report.

Existing blue carbon solutions such as seaweed farming, kelp forest conservation, and mangrove restoration could help cut emissions by 0.4 to 1.2 GtCO2e per year, with emerging solutions adding up to another 1.8GtCO2e, for a total of 3GtCO2e, or nearly 10 percent of all global energy-related emissions in 2021.

The report noted that blue bonds had attracted less interest than other sustainable debt products such as green bonds.

“These enjoyed a 49 percent growth rate in annual issuance in the five years leading up to 2021, reaching $620 billion in 2021, and inspiring offshoots, like social impact or sustainability bonds.”

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To Save Spotted Owls, US Officials Plan to Kill Half-million of Another Owl Species

California spotted owls were proposed for federal protections last year. A decision is pending. - The AP
California spotted owls were proposed for federal protections last year. A decision is pending. - The AP
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To Save Spotted Owls, US Officials Plan to Kill Half-million of Another Owl Species

California spotted owls were proposed for federal protections last year. A decision is pending. - The AP
California spotted owls were proposed for federal protections last year. A decision is pending. - The AP

To save the imperiled spotted owl from potential extinction, US wildlife officials are embracing a contentious plan to deploy trained shooters into dense West Coast forests to kill almost a half-million barred owls that are crowding out their smaller cousins.

The US Fish and Wildlife Service on Wednesday was expected to release its final plan to prop up declining spotted owl populations in Oregon, Washington state and California. The Associated Press obtained details in advance.

The plan calls for killing up to 470,000 barred owls over three decades after the birds from the eastern US encroached into the territory of two West Coast owls: northern spotted owls and California spotted owls. The smaller spotted owls have been unable to compete for food and habitat with the invaders.

Past efforts to save spotted owls focused on protecting the forests where they live. But the proliferation of barred owls in recent years is undermining that earlier work, officials said.

“We're at a crossroads. We have the science that indicates what we need to do to conserve the spotted owls, and that requires that we take action on the barred owls,” said Bridget Moran, a deputy state supervisor for the Fish and Wildlife Service in Oregon.

The notion of killing one bird species to save another has divided wildlife advocates and conservationists. Some grudgingly accepted the proposal after a draft version was announced last year; others denounced it as reckless and a diversion from needed forest preservation.

Barred owls already are being killed in spotted owl habitats for research purposes, with about 4,500 removed since 2009, said Robin Bown, barred owl strategy leader for the Fish and Wildlife Service. Those targeted included barred owls in California's Sierra Nevada region, where the animals have only recently arrived and officials want to stop populations from taking hold.

In other areas where barred owls are more established, officials aim to reduce their numbers but acknowledge shooting owls is unlikely to eliminate them entirely.

The new plan follows decades of conflict between conservationists and timber companies that cut down vast areas of older forests where spotted owls reside.

Early efforts to save the birds culminated in logging bans in the 1990s that roiled the timber industry and its political supporters in Congress.

Yet spotted owl populations continued to decline after barred owls first started showing up on the West Coast several decades ago.

Opponents say the mass killing of barred owls would cause severe disruption to forest ecosystems and could lead to other species — including spotted owls — being mistakenly shot. They’ve also challenged the notion that barred owls don’t belong on the West Coast, characterizing their expanding range as a natural ecological phenomenon.

“The practical elements of the plan are unworkable, and its adverse collateral effects would ripple throughout these forest habitats,” critics of the plan wrote in a letter earlier this year to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland that was signed by representatives of dozens of animal welfare groups.

Researchers say barred owls moved westward by one of two routes: across the Great Plains, where trees planted by settlers gave them a foothold in new areas; or via Canada’s boreal forests, which have become more hospitable as temperatures rise because of climate change.

Supporters of killing barred owls to save spotted owls include the American Bird Conservancy and other conservation groups.

“Our organizations stand in full support of barred owl removal as a necessary measure, together with increased habitat protections for all remaining mature and old-growth forests," the groups said in comments on a draft proposal to remove barred owls that was released last year.

Northern spotted owls are federally protected as a threatened species. Federal officials determined in 2020 that their continued decline merited an upgrade to the more critical designation of “endangered.” But the Fish and Wildlife Service refused to do so at the time, saying other species took priority.

California spotted owls were proposed for federal protections last year. A decision is pending.

Under former President Donald Trump, government officials stripped habitat protections for spotted owls at the behest of the timber industry. Those were reinstated under President Joe Biden after the Interior Department said political appointees under Trump relied on faulty science to justify their weakening of protections.