IHO Accredits World Ocean Council as Observer
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IHO Accredits World Ocean Council as Observer

The International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) has approved the World Ocean Council (WOC) as an official observer to this intergovernmental body. With formal IHO Observer status, the WOC increases its ability to ensure ocean business community involvement in the key intergovernmental bodies and processes on ocean science, policy, planning and regulations that are important to ocean industry activities.

IHO Secretary-General, Robert Ward, stated that we have better maps of the Moon and Mars than of most of our seas and oceans. The WOC is uniquely positioned to help the IHO improve the situation by engaging the diverse global ocean business community in collecting and sharing the vital hydrographic data that is essential to safe and sustainable ocean industry operations, and to coordinate this with the IHO via the WOC ‘Smart Ocean-Smart Industries’ programme.

Expanding Role of Ocean Industries

The ‘WOC Smart Ocean-Smart Industries’ (SO-SI) programme is working to expand the role of ocean industries in collecting and sharing of oceanographic information - including hydrographic data.

The SO-SI is developing coordinated programme to systematically engage the use of industry vessels, platforms, and other infrastructure (e.g. wind farms, aquaculture facilities) in hosting or deploying scientific instrumentation to gather data. Participation in the program enables companies to demonstrate their contribution to achieving Sustainable Development Goal 14a which calls for ‘increasing scientific knowledge’ of the ocean.

Advancing the development of the WOC ‘Smart Ocean-Smart Industries’ programme will be the focus of a session at the WOC Sustainable Ocean Summit (SOS), taking place in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, from 30 Nov-2 Dec 2016.

The SOS 2016 will again bring together CEOs and senior executives from a wide range of ocean industries, including: shipping, oil and gas, fisheries, aquaculture, tourism, offshore renewable energy, marine mining, ports, dredging, submarine cables, marine science/technology, the maritime legal, financial and insurance communities, and others.

 

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