The foundation of decision-making

In spite of the importance of the marine environment to humans, information on the status of the living resources and ecosystems of the sea is much less complete that that for terrestrial ecosystems. As the Regional Seas programmes got under way, many of them had enormous gaps in the scientific knowledge needed to underpin decisions about their structure and direction.

The first questions to be answered was "just how healthy - or unhealthy - is the marine environment"? And "What are the major causes of the environmental degradation we see?" Later, once practical action had been taken, "Just how effective have our efforts been?"

Ever since it was created, UNEP has worked with its sister agencies to help answer these questions through scientific monitoring and assessment programmes at global, regional and national levels.

The Regional Seas Programmes are closely linked to the global monitoring and research programmes of various international bodies, both benefiting from them and contributing to them data generated by regional programmes.

Regional Seas monitoring programmes
Global monitoring programmes