As a treaty to protect the High Seas entered into force this month with backing from more than 80 countries, major fishing nations China, Japan and Brazil secured a last-minute seat at the table to negotiate the procedural rules, funding and other key issues ahead of the treaty’s first COP.
The Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction (BBNJ) pact – known as the High Seas Treaty – was agreed in 2023. It is seen as key to achieving a global goal to protect at least 30% of the planet’s ecosystems by 2030, as it lays the legal foundation for creating international marine protected areas (MPAs) in the deep ocean. The high seas encompass two-thirds of the world’s ocean.
Last September, the treaty reached the key threshold of 60 national ratifications needed for it to enter into force – a number that has kept growing and currently stands at 83. In total, 145 countries have signed the pact, which indicates their intention to ratify it. The treaty formally took effect on January 17.
“In a world of accelerating crises – climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution – the agreement fills a critical governance gap to secure a resilient and productive ocean for all,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in a statement.
Julio Cordano, Chile’s director of environment, climate change and oceans, said the treaty is “one of the most important victories of our time”. He added that the Nazca and Salas y Gómez ridge – off the coast of South America in the Pacific – could be one of the first intact biodiversity hotspots to gain protection.
Scientists have warned the ocean is losing its capacity to act as a carbon sink, as emissions and global temperatures rise. Currently, the ocean traps around 90% of the excess planetary heat building up from global warming. Marine protected areas could become a tool to restore “blue carbon sinks”, by boosting carbon absorption in the seafloor and protecting carbon-trapping organisms such as microalgae.
Last-minute ratifications
Countries that have ratified the BBNJ will now be bound by some of its rules, including a key provision requiring countries to carry out environmental impact assessments (EIA) for activities that could have an impact on the deep ocean’s biodiversity, such as fisheries.
Activities that affect the ocean floor, such as deep-sea mining, will still fall under the jurisdiction of the International Seabed Authority (ISA).
Nations are still negotiating the rules of the BBNJ’s other provisions, including creating new MPAs and sharing genetic resources from biodiversity in the deep ocean. They will meet in one last negotiating session in late March, ahead of the treaty’s first COP (conference of the parties) set to take place in late 2026 or early 2027.
China and Japan – which are major fishing nations that operate in deep waters – ratified the BBNJ in December 2025, just as the treaty was about to enter into force. Other top fishing nations on the high seas like South Korea and Spain had already ratified the BBNJ last year.
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Tom Pickerell, ocean programme director at the World Resources Institute (WRI), said that while the last-minute ratifications from China, Japan and Brazil were not required for the treaty’s entry into force, they were about high-seas players ensuring they have a “seat at the table”.
“As major fishing nations and geopolitical powers, these countries recognise that upcoming BBNJ COP negotiations will shape rules affecting critical commercial sectors – from shipping and fisheries to biotechnology – and influence how governments engage with the treaty going forward,” Pickerell told Climate Home News.
Some major Western countries – including the US, Canada, Germany and the UK – have yet to ratify the treaty and unless they do, they will be left out of drafting its procedural rules. A group of 18 environmental groups urged the UK government to ratify it quickly, saying it would be a “failure of leadership” to miss the BBNJ’s first COP.
Finalising the rules
Countries will meet from March 23 to April 2 for the treaty’s last “preparatory commission” (PrepCom) session in New York, which is set to draft a proposal for the treaty’s procedural rules, among them on funding processes and where the secretariat will be hosted – with current offers coming from China in the city of Xiamen, Chile’s Valparaiso and Brussels in Belgium.
Janine Felson, a diplomat from Belize and co-chair of the “PrepCom”, told journalists in an online briefing “we’re now at a critical stage” because, with the treaty having entered into force, the preparatory commission is “pretty much a definitive moment for the agreement”.
Felson said countries will meet to “tidy up those rules that are necessary for the conference of the parties to convene” and for states to begin implementation. The first COP will adopt the rules of engagement.
She noted there are “some contentious issues” on whether the BBNJ should follow the structure of other international treaties such as the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), as well as differing opinions on how prescriptive its procedures should be.
“While there is this tension on how far can we be held to precedent, there is also recognition that this BBNJ agreement has quite a bit to contribute in enhancing global ocean governance,” she added.
