June 19th, 2023
B.C. Launches Action Plan and Funding to Tackle Climate Threats to Ocean, Coastal Communities, and Marine Ecosystems
The Tula Foundation’s Ocean Decade Collaborative Center for NE Pacific has received funding to support a new program that will focus on actions from the BC Ocean Acidification and Hypoxia Action Plan, a UN Ocean Decade endorsed project to help coastal communities understand, mitigate, and adapt to the effects of climate change on B.C.’s oceans and coasts, and protect seafood and marine life. Ocean acidification and hypoxia (low oxygen conditions), have the potential to impact marine organisms and ecosystems, with resulting effects on aquaculture and wild capture fisheries. Given these impacts, the BC seafood industry recognizes that climate change could significantly disrupt its contribution to BC’s food security and ocean economy.
The Province of BC, with support from an advisory committee and input from scientists, community members, aquaculture and fisheries representatives, and Indigenous, Local, Provincial, and Federal government representatives, recently completed and released the British Columbia Ocean Acidification and Hypoxia (BC OAH) Action Plan in response to a preliminary assessment that identified ocean acidification as a significant climate-change risk to B.C.’s seafood sector. The BC OAH Action Plan is supported by a comprehensive scientific assessment.
The Climate Ready BC Seafood Program will be delivered over the next two years by the Ocean Decade Collaborative Center for the NE Pacific and will target funding toward high-priority actions identified in the BC OAH Action Plan, such as:
research and scientific understanding of acidification and hypoxia;
marine carbon removal technologies; and
development and testing of acidification and hypoxia mitigation and adaptation strategies.
Learn more about the Climate Ready BC Seafood Program, the BC OAH plan and the importance of addressing climate change and the resulting impacts from Ocean Acidification and Hypoxia in the links below.
New program protects B.C.’s ocean, coastal communities | BC Gov News
Seafood producers get funding help to manage climate change challenges - My Comox Valley Now