The UNEP-coordinated Regional Seas Programme (RSP), which includes globally eighteen individual Regional Seas Conventions and Action Plans (RSCAP), is one of the key comparative advantages of UNEP in the field of the Regional Ocean Governance (ROG). Seven of them are directly administered by UNEP, and they provide secretariat services on 
behalf of the riparian to the corresponding water bodies countries. UNEP Executive Director (ED) traditionally pays significant attention to supporting and mainstreaming activities of the RSCAPs in the respective regions and globally. A meeting of UNEP ED and UNEP Senior Management Team with the Coordinators of the UNEP-administered RSCAPs is regularly organised to ensure proper feedback from the regions and strategic guidance by senior UNEP officials to individual Regional Seas Programmes.
Such a meeting was organised on 10 February 2022 virtually. The key objectives of this meeting were to provide an update on the developments within the global environmental agenda and hold discussions on the newly finalised Regional Seas Strategic Directions (RSSD) 2022-2025 and on Regional Seas Conventions and Action Plans work on marine litter and plastic pollution. Specifically, the discussions focused on how well UNEP and RSCAPs are positioned to implement the new Strategic Directors and how best to follow and facilitate the current developments and process of a Global Plastics Agreement.
During the meeting, it was emphasised that RSCAPs have experience and play an important role in addressing Marine Litter Management issues and plastic pollution, which is one of the key focus of the most, if not all, RSCAPs. It has been recognised that Regional Seas have made important contributions to advancing the awareness of and progress in addressing marine litter issues. Being stationed at the regional level and having had direct links to their Member States, they possess a strategic advantage when it comes to identifying and reflecting the contemporary global environmental challenges related to marine litter, as well as to introducing legal and policy frameworks specifically built and fine-tuned within the Regional Seas and Conventions networks.
It was also stressed that RSCAPs are well fitted to provide integrated solutions that encompass environmental and sustainability aspects related to marine litter through holistic approaches, they deal directly with national authorities in the respective regions through their Member States and, as such, have the "finger on the pulse", as they support the countries in navigating the regional environmental geopolitics.
And finally, Regional Seas can play an important role in continued progress during the negotiations and before the agreement enters into force and implementation of future commitments.
Regional Seas Strategic Directions 2022-2025
The Regional Seas Strategic Directions 2022-2025 were developed with and supported by all eighteen RSCAPs’ Secretariats at a virtual meeting in May 2021.
RSSD 2022-2025 sets out three overarching goals:
- Secure diverse, resilient, and productive marine and coastal ecosystems
- Support assessment, information and knowledge management at all levels to strengthen science-policy dialogue on marine and coastal issues and their interactions
- Increase the outreach and mainstreaming of the Regional Seas Programme, including advocacy, political support and dialogue for furthering action
Global Agreement on Marine Litter and plastics; factoring in the Regional Seas Conventions and Action Plans
UNEP's Regional Seas Programme has a long history of supporting countries in addressing marine pollution and the corresponding negative impacts. The transboundary nature of pollution – in both its cause and its impact – requires collective and coordinated efforts to reduce its impact, a role the regional seas are well placed to tackle.
Within the Regional Seas Programme legally binding protocols and regional action plans[1] and strategies to guide such activities have been adopted and codified, including adopting the Polluter Pays Principle, a precautionary and ecosystem-based management approach, and encouraging investment in coastal ecosystem conservation.
Examples of key actions taken to control, reduce and mitigate the impacts of pollution include:
- Monitoring the status of pollutants and marine and coastal ecosystems
- Identifying sources of pollution
- Assessing the environmental, social and economic impact of pollution
- Strategic Environmental Assessments (SEA) and Environmental impact assessments (EIA)
- Developing indicators and assessment approaches.
Entities of the Regional Seas Programme have welcomed the global effort by countries to address marine litter and microplastics. This support is demonstrated through the various COP and IGM decisions adopted by the regional seas’ conventions and action plans.
[1] A total of thirteen regional marine litter action plans are now in place. Three additional action plans are in preparation for the North-East Pacific: West, Central and Southern Africa and the Caspian Sea.
