Highlights for Tuesday, 26 February 2019
Bird’s eye view of the Council’s deliberations
On Tuesday, the Council of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) continued its deliberations on components of the draft regulations for exploitation of mineral resources in the Area, focusing on:
regulatory efficiency, including potential delegation of functions by the Council to the Secretariat;
the relationship between the draft exploitation regulations and regional environmental management plans (REMPs); and
implementation of the precautionary approach to activities in the Area.
Highlights of the day include:
general agreement that REMPs should be developed before commercial mining activities commence;
in-depth discussion on which functions of the Council could be delegated to the Secretariat to increase efficiency; and
agreement on the importance of implementing the precautionary approach/principle to activities in the Area, but ongoing debate about which terminology to use.
During lunchtime, a side event organized by the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies in Potsdam, and the German Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt), focused on developing a benefit-sharing mechanism appropriate for the common heritage of mankind. For extensive details on the day’s negotiations and to hear what delegates said in the corridors, see our daily Earth Negotiations Bulletin.
IISD Reporting Services, through its Earth Negotiations Bulletin (ENB) Meeting Coverage, provided daily web coverage and daily reports from the 1st Part of ISA-25. In addition, IISD Reporting Services, has published a summary and analysis report of the meeting, which is available in HTML and PDF.
Photos by IISD/ENB | Diego Noguera
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Kathy Ann Brown, Jamaica
Christopher Brown, ISA Secretariat
Tetsuya Yoshimoto, Japan
Enrico Milano, Italy
Siosiua ‘Utoikamanu and Tevita Suka Mangisi, Tonga
Didier Ortolland, France
Nicole Lyas and David Yardley, Australia
Clement Yow Mulalap, Federated States of Micronesia
Francisco Javier Bernales, Chile
ISA delegates in informal consultations
José María Bosch Bessa, Spain
Ernesto Malda, Mexico
Carlos Alberto Michaelsen den Hartog, Brazil, in consultation with Amanda Fraser, Trinidad and Tobago
Lumka Yengeni, South Africa, Council President for the 25th Session; Thembile Joyini, South Africa; and Gwénaëlle Le Gurun, ISA Secretariat
L-R: Wini Broadbelt, Laurens J. de Jonge, and Tom Diederen, the Netherlands
G. Ananda Ramadass and Maruthadu Sudhakar, India
Li Linlin and Hu Bing, China
Graham Leung, Nauru
Andreas Motzfeldt Kravik, Norway
Ingo Narberhaus and Urs Daniel Engels, Germany
Kristina Gjerde, International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)
Malakai Finau, Fiji
Alfonso Ascencio-Herrera, ISA Legal Counsel and Deputy to the Secretary-General, and Michael Lodge, ISA Secretary-General
Laurent Assoumou and Major Tano Koffi Bertin, Côte d’Ivoire
Commodore Emeka Okafor and Nurudeen Abba, Nigeria
Russell Howorth, Fiji; Alison Swaddling and Hannah Lily, the Commonwealth; and Malakai Finau, Fiji
The Brazilian delegation in discussions with the ENB team
Delegates start their day reading the ENB
Around the Venue
The garden outside the plenary room
A view from the venue