Africa Hosts First Ocean Conference, Pushes Marine Protection

For the first time in its 12-year history, the world's most influential ocean gathering is coming to Africa, and it couldn't happen at a better moment.

The Our Ocean Conference will meet in Kenya this June, just months after a groundbreaking High Seas Treaty became international law in January 2025. The treaty gives the world its first real tool to protect the nearly half of our planet covered by international waters.

Former Seychelles President James Michel knows what's possible when small nations lead boldly. Back in 2012, his island nation promised to protect 30% of its ocean territory by 2020, a full decade before the rest of the world set similar goals.

Seychelles delivered on that promise in March 2020, creating marine protected areas covering 410,000 square kilometers. That's larger than Germany. The nation also pioneered the world's first "blue bond" in 2018, borrowing $15 million at less than half the usual interest rate to fund ocean protection and sustainable fishing.

Now Michel and other advocates are pushing for Africa to take the lead on one of the ocean's most urgent debates: deep-sea mining. Companies want to vacuum up mineral deposits from the seafloor to supply batteries and green technology, but scientists warn the damage could be irreversible.

Communities who depend on healthy oceans for food and income worry they'll bear the costs while wealthy nations and corporations reap the benefits. It's a pattern that's played out on land for centuries, and ocean advocates are determined not to repeat it underwater.

The Ripple Effect

The Kenyan conference theme says it all: "Our Ocean, Our Heritage, Our Future." That framing puts jobs, fairness and healthy ecosystems at the center of ocean policy, not just mining profits or geopolitical power plays.

Michel recently joined philanthropist Dona Bertarelli in calling for a pause on deep-sea mining in the Indian Ocean. Their message is simple: we need to understand what we're protecting before we start digging it up.

The High Seas Treaty now gives developing nations a seat at the table when decisions are made about international waters. Whether that translates into real power or just symbolic gestures will depend partly on what happens in Kenya this June.

For coastal communities across Africa and the Global South, the ocean isn't an abstraction or a resource to exploit. It's heritage, livelihood and future all at once, and they're finally getting a chance to shape how it's protected.