The United Nations has acknowledged that problems relating to biodiversity depletion, climate change and a worsening of health and living conditions continue to intensify. In light of an ever-growing need for integrated solutions to make development more sustainable, the United Nations has approved the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
The 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the Agenda officially came into force in 2016 and cover the three dimensions of sustainable development, namely economic growth, social inclusion and environmental protection.
Encompassing a total of 17 volumes, Springer鈥檚 Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals comprehensively addresses the SDGs in an integrated way, by dedicating a separate volume to each one of the 17 SDGs.
The 14th volume, addressing SDG 14 Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development, features a work co-authored by University of Malta Prof. Charles Galdies, from SINTEF Ocean in Trondheim, Norway, and from the Faculty of Laws at the University of Copenhagen.
This latest focuses on the topic of marine and coastal bio-resources, which play an essential role in human wellbeing and social and economic development. Among many other impacts, the rising levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, are changing the ocean鈥檚 chemistry, making the ocean more acidic and leading to deleterious harm to marine ecosystems.
This ocean acidification problem causes an increased pressure on marine living resources, which are already under intense physicochemical and biological stress due to increased ocean warming, changes in their ecosystems, and the introduction of alien, competing species.
One of the well-known effects of ocean acidification is the lowering of calcium carbonate saturation states, which negatively impacts shell-forming marine organisms that range widely from plankton to benthic molluscs, echinoderms, and corals. The potential for marine organisms to adapt to increasing CO2 and its broader implication to ocean ecosystems are still not fully understood, as are those processes that tend to exacerbate ocean acidification, especially within coastal areas.
Supported by their recent, separate publications on the topic, the authors claim that the most effective way to limit ocean acidification is two pronged: to continue implementing solutions to reduce CO2 emissions, and equally important, and to give a stronger prioritisation toward managing and reducing multiple stressors. Research priorities to incorporate ocean acidification into ocean governance are being strongly and urgently recommended.
