The High Seas Treaty Is a Win for the Ocean, and for the Peoples Who Have Always Cared for It
At long last, the world has taken a step toward rethinking a century old assumption, that the open ocean beyond any nation’s jurisdiction is a realm of “free access” and free for all exploitation. The newly adopted High Seas Treaty, formally known as the Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction, or BBNJ Agreement, is not a perfect solution to the twin crises of climate change and biodiversity loss. But it is a historic breakthrough, and one that resonates deeply with Indigenous ocean communities whose voices have too often been erased in global governance.
The science is clear. The high seas, the waters that make up nearly half of the planet’s surface, are essential to the global climate system. They regulate atmospheric temperatures, sequester carbon, and host ecosystems critical for fish, whales, corals, and microscopic life alike. Yet for decades, these waters have existed in a legal grey zone, perceived by distant capitals and corporations as terra nullius of the sea, open, empty, a frontier. A place to extract without accountability. A space where the climate consequences of mismanagement could be outsourced to those least responsible and least resourced to respond.
The new High Seas Treaty changes that narrative. For the first time, there is a binding international framework to protect marine biodiversity through area based management tools such as marine protected areas, require environmental impact assessments for proposed activities that may harm high seas ecosystems, and facilitate more equitable sharing of benefits arising from marine genetic resources, including for nations that lack the industrial capacity to exploit them.
For many, these may read as technical legal mechanisms. But for Indigenous and island communities, like those of the Marianas and across the Pacific, they are profoundly relational. They align, at least in spirit, with a worldview that has never seen the ocean as a void, but as a living system of kinship, a teacher, a pantry, a pathway, a medicine chest, a calendar, and a library of knowledge carried in waves and winds.
Long before colonial map lines and maritime jurisdiction zones, Pacific Islanders navigated the deep ocean with remarkable precision and deep ecological understanding. We understood currents as carriers of climate signals. We saw species not as commodities, but as relatives. We knew that the health of the deep blue is inseparable from the health of our bodies, our communities, and future generations.
From this vantage point, the High Seas Treaty does more than fill a legal vacuum. It challenges a colonial worldview. That worldview treated the ocean as empty, as outside of social and moral obligation, and as a hinterland for extractive ambition. These ambitions are now taking shape in new pressures, deep sea mining, industrial fishing expansion, and the commodification of marine genetic materials, all unfolding while island communities face rising seas, disrupted fisheries, and cultural erasure.
This treaty does not solve every challenge. It leaves critical questions unanswered about enforcement, equity, and how environmental protections will be implemented. It does not automatically halt harmful activities overnight. But it creates a legal and moral foundation, a beginning rather than an endpoint, upon which Small Island States, Indigenous advocates, and coastal communities can resist the framing of the deep ocean as a sacrifice zone. It reframes ocean governance as stewardship rather than unchecked freedom.
To the diplomats, scientists, legal experts, Indigenous advocates, and Small Island States who worked tirelessly for nearly two decades to make this agreement possible, often against impossible odds, this moment belongs to you. The late nights, the countless drafts, the coalition building across languages and cultures, it all matters. This treaty signals a shift not only in law, but in who is seen and heard at the tables that shape planetary futures.
Every Pacific Islander should celebrate this moment. Not because the work is finished, but because we are no longer invisible in the governance of the blue planet. The ocean remembers our connections. Our star paths, canoe traditions, seasonal knowledge, and songs have always testified to a long history of care and responsibility.
The ocean remembers us.
Now the law is beginning to remember to too.
By Eipéráng (Gregorie Michael Towai)
Editor’s note: The views and opinions expressed in this op-ed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of NMI News Service or its staff. All assertions are the sole responsibility of the writer.
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