STAP organized a side event “Seeking Global and Regional Solutions to Marine Debris Problem” at the 5th International Marine Debris Conference on 23 March 2011, Honolulu, HI.
The half-day side event was held to elaborate the discussion on marine debris by focusing on a number of critical issues related to global and regional responses to marine debris in the coastal and open ocean areas or areas beyond national jurisdiction (ABNJ). The discussion contributed to the development of the Honolulu Strategy, “A Global Strategy for Prevention, Reduction, and Management of Marine Debris,” which was to be one of the conference outcomes. The intention was to build on the scientific expertise present at the conference while also bringing together representatives of intergovernmental organizations, small island states, scientists, policy makers from MEAs, civil society and the business community. It served to help explore a specific role of the GEF in supporting global efforts aimed at addressing the marine debris problem.
The program included a series of keynote presentations followed by a roundtable discussion leading to specific recommendations on the following themes:
- Review of the current knowledge about the impacts of marine debris on marine global biodiversity and the marine environment in general, including the impacts of transport of persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic substances;
- Review of the existing global governance framework for marine debris and identification of legal, institutional and management gaps including marine debris coverage under several multilateral environmental agreements;
- Successes and challenges at the regional level: perspectives from Regional Seas Conventions;
- Role of industries and the potential for public-private partnerships at the global and regional levels;
- Prioritization of global and regional response actions to marine debris problem: setting short-term targets as a part of a long-term transformation.
Agenda
Bios and Presentations of Invited Experts
Henk Bouwman (pdf of presentation)
Henk Bouwman is a STAP Advisor on POPs and Ozone Depletion. Henk is Professor at the North-West University in Potchefstroom in South Africa. His work concentrates mainly on the ecology of birds and the so called Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs). He has acted as advisor to the Government on POPs and has also been an accredited member of the South African team in international negotiation fora. Other aspects of his work relates to endocrine disruptors and the effects of pollutants on earthworms and birds. He is currently leader and a co-leader for more than 10 M.Sc and Ph.D students on various aspects of pollution, POPs and birds. He has published 48 refereed papers in scientific journals, and is involved in a number of projects, both as leader / co-ordinator, or as collaborator or advisor, with local and international research organizations.
Lev Neretin (pdf of presentation)
Lev Neretin, a Programme Officer in the STAP Secretariat, is a graduate of the Moscow State University and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. He spent more than 10 years in academia working on ocean biogeochemical cycles and marine microbial ecology. Before joining STAP Secretariat, Lev worked as a Biodiversity Expert of the Caspian Environment Programme and GEF Task Manager (Biodiversity and International Waters) based in UNEP's Moscow office. In his later position Lev supervised projects dealing with environmental protection of the Russian Arctic.
Richard Thompson
Richard Thompson is a Professor at the School of Marine Science and Engineering in University of Plymouth, UK. Richard is a leading expert on marine debris and plastics in the environment. Richard’s research focuses on three main topics: the effects of plastic debris in the marine environment, the ecology and conservation of shallow water habitats and habitat modification to enhance biodiversity of marine engineering such as coastal defences and off-shore renewable energy devices. Richard has been working on the effects of plastic in the marine environment for over a decade. In 2004 his group showed that waters around the north-east Atlantic had become contaminated by microscopic fragments of plastic or ‘microplastic’ and that the abundance of this material had increased significantly over the last 40 years. Richard and the group he leads are at the forefront of research to establish the environmental consequences of this newly described form of marine debris.
Bruce LaBelle
Bruce is a Chief of the Environmental Chemistry Laboratory at Cal/EPA, Department of Toxic Substances Control. He has a Ph.D. in organic chemistry. His laboratory measures chemicals in people, wildlife, soil, water, waste, and consumer products as a toxic early warning system to support new policies, and to provide scientific evidence for environmental enforcement and cleanup. He also leads work on life cycle alternatives assessments as part of California’s Green Chemistry Initiative.
David Johnson (pdf of presentation)
David Johnson is Executive Secretary to the OSPAR Commission based in London and Emeritus Professor of Coastal Management at Southampton Solent University. After time as a Royal Navy officer, countryside conservation trainer and an environmental consultant he became a full-time academic in 1992. He is a Chartered geographer and promotes geography within higher education through lecturing, course design and as a Subject Review Specialist for the Quality Assurance Agency. He is currently also a Visiting Professor at the World Maritime University in Sweden.
Alexander Tkalin (pdf of presentation)
Alexander Tkalin is Coordinator of the Northwest Pacific Action Plan (NOWPAP) and is based in Busan, Korea. Alexander has been involved in preparation and implementation of NOWPAP since 1991, first as a national expert and IOC UNESCO consultant and then (from 2004) as Coordinator. Since 1987, after getting his PhD degree in environmental conservation from the State Oceanographic Institute in Moscow (Russia), Alexander has designed and implemented a few international multidisciplinary projects and led several joint expeditions in the NW Pacific and its marginal seas with specialists from People’s Republic of China, DPRK, Japan, Republic of Korea, Vietnam and USA.
Catherine Siota (pdf of presentation)
Catherine graduated with Bachelor of Science in Marine and Fisheries Biology from the University of Papua New Guinea.Her background is in marine turtle and conservation work, which also included the establishment of community marine conservation areas in the Solomon Islands for the past 6 years while working with The Nature Conservancy, Solomon Islands field office. Catherine recently joined South Pacific Regional Environment Programme as the Associate Turtle Database Officer coordinating the regional marine turtle tagging programme and also carrying out training on the Marine Turtle Research and Monitoring Database (TREDS) in the Pacific region.
Prakash Kowlesser (pdf of presentation)
Mr. Prakash Kowlesser worked , as Environment Officer, at the Mauritian Ministry of Environment during the period December 1990 to December 1999 and has been heading the Solid Waste Division of the Ministry of Local Government since January 2000 to date. Mr. Kowlesser is a senior and respected figure in solid and hazardous waste management in the region and internationally. He has carried out a number of consultancy missions for UNEP, World Food Programme, the Indian Ocean Commission and the UNDP. During the period from 1998 to 2002, Mr. Kowlesser was Member of the Extended Bureau of the Basel Convention on the control of transboundary movements of hazardous wastes and their disposal and between 2003 and 2006 he was a Member of the Committee for promoting Implementation and Compliance of the same Convention. He has also a number of publications to his credit.
Christopher Corbin (pdf of presentation)
Chris is a Programme Officer within the Division of Environmental Policy Implementation (DEPI) based at UNEP's Caribbean Regional Seas Programme (CEP) in Kingston, Jamaica. He is responsible for the sub-programme for the Assessment and Management of Environmental Pollution (AMEP) and coordinates the development and implementation of national and regional projects and activities for two legally binding regional Agreements. Chris has worked on several regional projects including regional GEF funded projects for Pesticide Reduction in Central America and Integrating Watersheds and Coastal Area Management in Caribbean SIDS. He also led the development of a Regional Action Plan for Marine Litter in the Caribbean and several national and regional pilot projects related to Marine Litter and Solid Waste Management. Mr. Corbin, a Saint Lucian national born in Barbados, has over 24 years of experience in the development, implementation and evaluation of environment and sustainable development policies and projects.
Jihyun Lee (pdf of presentation)
Jihyun Lee is the Environmental Affairs Officer for marine and coastal biodiversity and the ecosystem approach within the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity of the United Nations Environment Programme. She serves as a coordinator for UN-Oceans Task Force on Marine Protected Areas and Other Area-Based Management Tools as well as Working Group on Marine Biodiversity and Networks of Marine Protected Areas of the Global Forum on Oceans, Coasts and Islands. Before she joined the CBD Secretariat on March 2007, she had worked for GEF/UNDP/IMO Regional Programme on Partnerships in Environmental Management for the Seas of East Asia (PEMSEA), as a Senior Programme Officer in charge of integrated coastal management, for about seven years.
David Osborn (pdf of presentation)
David Osborn is the Coordinator for the Global Programme of Action for the Protection of the Marine Environment from Land-based Activities (GPA), the only intergovernmental programme addressing the link between watersheds and coastal ecosystems. A former Officer with the Royal Australian Navy and civil servant with the Australian Government's Department of the Environment and Heritage, David served with the UNEP GPA Coordination Office in The Hague from 2001 to 2005. In late 2005 he returned to Australia where he lead the preparation of Australia's National Programme of Action for the Protection of the Marine Environment from Land-based Activities while Director, Coastal Policy, with the Department of the Environment and Water Resources. He also spent time as a Director with the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority before rejoining UNEP in Nairobi as the GPA Coordinator in late 2008.
Blaise Kuemlangan (pdf of presentation)
Blaise Kuemlangan has been a lawyer with the Legal Office of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) since 1996. He is currently the Chief of FAO’s Development Law Service. He specializes in providing legal assistance, in particular developing national legal frameworks, for the management and development of fisheries and aquaculture in FAO member countries. He was a technical and legal adviser in the process of establishing two regional fisheries management organizations and recently provided secretarial and legal support to the development of several Agreements and International Guidelines on fisheries and aquaculture. Prior to joining FAO, Blaise Kuemlangan was a senior legal officer with the Department of Justice and Attorney General of Papua New Guinea.
Captain David A Condino (pdf of presentation)
Capt. David Condino, Master Mariner, USMM, is a Project Manager for MARPOL Programs in the Office of Port and Facilities Activities, at US Coast Guard Headquarters in Washington, DC. He has over 20 years sea going experience on all types of deep sea vessels including deep sea research vessels. His shore-side experience includes a stint as a ship yard General Manager and as principal of a marine survey and consulting firm. He has lectured at institutions and organizations around his native New England and taught classes and demonstrations in celestial navigation, boatbuilding and marine science. Capt. Condino brings many years of practical experience in the maritime sector to his present position with the US Coast Guard as a marine environmental protection policy expert. In 2007, Capt. Condino was designated as US representative to, and in 2008 the US was invited to chair, an IMO FSI Subcommittee correspondence group on MARPOL obligations of Parties to the Convention.
Steven Russell (pdf of presentation)
Steven Russell joined the American Chemistry Council (ACC) in 1995 and currently serves as the Vice President of the Plastics Division. In that role he manages programs and research to support opportunities for plastics in key end use markets, and he leads the Division’s sustainability initiatives which include programs on recycling and energy recovery, consumer outreach, and proactive, solutions-oriented responses to plastic litter and marine debris. Mr. Russell previously served as ACC’s representative on chemical management policy issues in the US as a member of EPA’s National Pollution Prevention and Toxics Advisory Committee, and in Europe as Chairman of the Chemicals Committee of the Business and Industry Advisory Group for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Prior to joining ACC Mr. Russell was in private legal practice, including as legal counsel to the National Agricultural Chemicals Association (currently Crop Life America).
Jean-Pierre De Grève (pdf of presentation)
Jean-Pierre De Grève in his early career worked as a lecturer in Chemical Engineering and Chemical Technology at the University of Algiers before moving into mainstream industrial chemistry. He formerly worked within Solvay in production, construction, waste management and safety and environmental arenas. He was also the chairman of BelgoChlor, the association of Belgian chlorine producers, between 1993 and 1997. In January 1998, he joined the European Council of Vinyl Manufacturers as Technical and Environmental Affairs Manager and was appointed Executive Director in September 1999. In addition he became General Manager of Vinyl 2010 the following year. Jean-Pierre has been chairing the Global Vinyl Council from 2001 to October 2003 and also from 2005 – 2009. In March 2009, he became Deputy Executive Director of PlasticsEurope, in charge of Advocacy and Communications.
John Davis (pdf of presentation)
John Davis is president of Marine Affairs Research and Education, an NGO based in Seattle. The organization is a leading provider of information and consulting services to ocean management professionals worldwide, with clients in more than 120 countries. John holds a master's degree in marine policy from the University of Washington.
Keith Christman (pdf of presentation)
Keith Christman is Managing Director of Plastic Markets at the American Chemistry Council’s Plastics Division where he oversees the council’s Automotive, Building and Construction, Packaging and several work groups. In this role he leads the division’s efforts to promote more fuel efficient cars and trucks using lightweight plastics, promote enhanced energy codes to reduce building energy use through plastic insulation and oversees ACC Packaging Team efforts to reduce marine debris. Previously Keith worked on ACC’s sustainable packaging initiatives, including work with Wal-Mart’s Packaging Sustainable Value Network where he helped ensure that Wal-Mart had new Life Cycle Inventory data for plastics long before any other industry. Keith has nearly 20 years of public environmental policy experience. Prior to this work in Plastics, Keith was with the Chlorine Chemistry Council (now ACC Chlorine Division) for 8 years as Senior Director of Risk Management Policy and Senior Director of Disinfection Issues, where he was a member of the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Federal Advisory Committee for Microbes and Disinfection Byproducts. Keith has a Master of Science in Economics from the University of Delaware.
Photo credit: Julie Stowell