To conclude the webinar series on the road to the 2026 Our Ocean Conference in Kenya, the OCM and its partners presented the fourth and final session: "Raising Political Ambition for Ocean-Climate Action”. This panel highlighted real-world NDC integrations, speakers emphasized that effective climate action requires global cooperation, locally driven solutions, and a strong focus on gender and equity for truly inclusive progress.
Concrete opportunities for countries to integrate ocean action into their climate goals.
The need for international cooperation that drives tailored, local solutions.
A strong emphasis on integrating gender and equity so no community is left behind.
This session was a part of the series "Collectively Raising Our Ambitions on the Road to the Our Ocean Conference in Kenya," hosted by the Wider Caribbean Ocean Coordination Mechanism and its partners and was moderated by Mr. Alexander Giravan from the OCM Secretariat.
The welcome remarks started with Dr. Tom Pickerell, Head of the High Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy Secretariat. He began his remarks by highlighting that, “for a long time, the ocean was seen mainly as something to adapt to, you know, a source of risk, vulnerability, and damage. But that framing is now changing, because we understand much more clearly that the sustainable ocean economy is one of our greatest assets in the fight against climate change.” He also explained that the value of ocean climate action is not only about emission reductions, noting, “research from WRI and the OECD shows that real resilience comes not just from protecting, but from creating the conditions for economies and communities to thrive under climate pressure.”
The Country Champion Remarks featured a presentation by Mr. Olivier Poivre d'Arvor, Special Envoy for the Ocean and Poles for the Government of France, who stated: “The Paris Agreement states that we must ensure the integrity of all ecosystems, including the ocean and the protection of biodiversity. That is why, 10 years after Paris, we organized the United Nations Ocean Conference, UNOC 3 in Nice, where, together with Brazil, we launched the Blue NDC Challenge.” He further elaborated on what the challenge consists of—integrating sustainable, ocean-based climate action into national climate plans—adding that the NDC process “is truly about placing the ocean at the heart of our fight against climate change.”
Afterwards, Ms. Ana Paula Leite Prates, Director of the Department of Ocean and Coastal Management at the Secretariat for Climate Change for the Government of Brazil, echoed Mr. Olivier's message and provided context regarding Brazil’s work: "It is important to emphasize that we cannot simply use inappropriate methods that impact the ocean. During the G20 presidency in 2024 in Brazil, we stimulated the promotion and support for the development of comprehensive marine spatial planning and integrated coastal zone management for the countries, and we stimulated them to identify with the BBNJ treaty. Procoral is a national strategy for coral reefs in Brazil and marine spatial planning."
She touched upon key concepts such as the critical importance of Marine Spatial Planning (MSP), the development of a sustainable blue ocean-based economy, and the establishment of marine protected areas. Furthermore, she provided an overview of their Coastal Zone Plan alongside specific actions suitable for inclusion in NDCs. She also shared another significant example of advancing these goals: during COP30, Brazil and France announced their joint support for the creation of an Ocean Task Force. She explained that “this task force will serve as a global mechanism specifically designed to accelerate the integration of ocean-based solutions into National Climate Plans worldwide.”
Micheline Khan, Senior Associate for Ocean-Climate at the WRI, during her Technical Awareness Raising presentation, explained: “In fact, over 90% of ocean actions focus on adaptation, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, and Oceania. Yet the pace and scale of action remains far too low to protect vulnerable communities and livelihoods. And the gaps in technology and knowledge transfer are really holding back effective action. And what's alarming is that it's just 13% of ocean-based actions that explicitly address equity, even though women, youth, and Indigenous people in local and coastal communities are often hit the hardest by climate impacts.”
She added that the next five years really have to focus on deepening ambition, closing equity gaps, and moving from plans to implementation. This highlights why the task force is so critical as they onboard delivery partners and orient existing facilities and tools to build a Blue NDC implementation toolkit for members, helping to close the gaps and overcome the challenges they face in implementing NDC measures.
Thomas Hickey, Project Director for the Advancing Coastal Wetlands Conservation project at the Pew Charitable Trusts, explained: "We do not want paper political commitments. We want to make sure that at the point an NDC is submitted, it has a foundation of implementation support that will mean we can move swiftly to action."
Pew’s work focuses on turning these high-level political commitments into on-the-ground reality through targeted, country-specific support. He highlighted their work and its impact in the Caribbean, specifically mentioning Jamaica, Belize, Panama, Costa Rica, and Honduras.
Following the presentations, the panel discussions featured remarks from Jeniffer Hanna Collado, Regional Manager for Latin America & Caribbean at the NDC Partnership Support Unit, and Gabrielle Larricq from the Government of France, alongside interventions from the other panelists. Ms. Collado pointed out that: "what the partnership does is, we work with the countries to highlight and identify those needs and priorities that they have already identified in the NDC. Specifically for the cycle of the NDC, the partnership went through what we call a global call for NDC 3.0 and LT-LEDS, which was a dedicated window to support the development and submission of the NDC 3.0 of the countries. What we do is deployment of in-country facilitators and embedded advisors, which the goal is basically to strengthen the capacity in developing country members and also foster the in-country coordination and alignment of support. In LAC, we have around 15 in-country facilitators, and at this moment, around 5 embedded advisors". Finally, Gabrielle Larricq emphasized that the success of the Blue NDC challenge relies heavily on country ownership, strictly following the framework of the Paris Agreement, and noted, “It is still quite useful to be able to remind people that the ocean, which is cross-cutting, has so many subjects—whether it's maritime transport or food—it deserves to have its place."
All you need to know is here! Watch the webinar series sessions now: find all the details and dive into all the topics we covered. We've got all the takeaways waiting for you!
