Bridging Past and Present: Underwater Cultural Heritage at the 2024 UN Ocean Decade Conference

The Ocean Foundation was thrilled to participate in the 2024 United Nations Ocean Decade conference in Barcelona, Spain. The conference brought together scientists, policymakers, youth, Indigenous people, and local communities from around the world, aiming to take the next step in delivering “the science we need for the ocean we want.”

How The Ocean Foundation’s Initiatives Align with UN Ocean Decade Challenges

The Ocean Decade’s 10 Challenges are well aligned with the work of The Ocean Foundation from many angles. From Challenge 1 (Understand and Beat Marine Pollution) to Challenge 2 (Protect and Restore Ecosystems and Biodiversity) and 6 (Increase Community Resilience to Ocean Hazards), our work on Plastics and Blue Resilience seeks similar solutions. Challenges 6 and 7 (Skills, Knowledge, and Technology for All) aim for discussions similar to our Ocean Science Equity Initiative. At the same time, Challenge 10 (Change Humanity’s Relationship with the Ocean) and the conference as a whole support similar conversations on ocean literacy within our Teach For the Ocean Initiative and our projects on Underwater Cultural Heritage (UCH). We were excited to introduce conference participants to our core initiatives and our Threats to Our Ocean Heritage open-access book series project with Lloyd’s Register Foundation. 

The (Cultural) Science We Need

Our Threats to Our Ocean Heritage project includes a long-term goal of increasing conversations on ocean literacy around UCH. With this in mind, we joined forces with the International Council on Monuments and Sites’ (ICOMOS) International Committee on the Underwater Cultural Heritage (ICUCH) to host a booth at the conference. As the only booth sharing information on UCH, we welcomed conference participants and connected those interested in learning more about cultural heritage with more than 15 underwater cultural heritage experts and representatives of the UN Ocean Decade Heritage Network (UN ODHN) in attendance. We talked with many of the 1,500 conference attendees, handing out more than 200 stickers and stacks of handouts, while encouraging participants to read our poster presentation.

For the Ocean (Heritage) We Want

Cultural heritage discussions during the conference sessions were limited but present, with presentations from Indigenous attendees, maritime archeologists, and anthropologists. Panels encouraged participants to think about the inherent connection of natural heritage, like biodiversity, ecology, and ocean systems, with the cultural traditional understanding of the environment, ancestral methods of conservation, and how to combine both into a positive and holistic method for ensuring the “ocean we want.” Intangible cultural heritage was spoken to by a series of Indigenous and local leaders from the Pacific Islands, New Zealand, and Australia, as they called for a need to recenter humanity’s historical connection with the ocean into modern science, and for codesign of projects that seek to include both traditional knowledge and western science. While each presentation tackled a different part of the topic, a common thread followed each speaker: 

Looking to the Future on Underwater Cultural Heritage

We look forward to centering discussions on Underwater Cultural Heritage over the next year, releasing three books on Threats to our Ocean Heritage, and supporting work around the world toward achieving the cultural science we need for the protection of ocean heritage we want.