Good planning, management and protection of our ocean and seas requires reliable data on which to base decision making. In recent years, growing realisation of this need has led to much greater demand for improved ocean economy statistics. That demand is emerging at local and regional levels but also, and especially, at international level where the importance of interlinkages between ocean economic activities, ever increasing uses of marine space and resources, marine environmental dynamics, biodiversity loss
and global climate change have become increasingly clear.
For the past six years, the Ocean Economy Group of the OECD’s Directorate for Science, Technology and Innovation (OECD STI Ocean Economy Group) has contributed to meeting the growing demand for improved ocean economy statistics to support decision-making.
The flagship publication The Ocean Economy to 2030 (OECD, 2016[1]) focussed on the economic contribution of ocean related industries worldwide and estimated that, in 2010, they produced value-added equivalent to 3% of global GDP and full-time employment for around 30 million people. Such a snapshot proved essential for raising awareness and encouraging strategic thinking about the ocean economy around the globe. And chapter four of the book Rethinking Innovation for a Sustainable Ocean Economy (OECD, 2019[2]) emphasised recent progress towards measuring the ocean economy through national statistical systems. It underlined the advances that need to be made in national accounting approaches that incorporate both pillars of the ocean economy – the contribution of ocean economic activities and the assets and ecosystem services provided by the marine environment.
More infomation: Blueprint for improved measurement of the international ocean economy: An exploration of satellite accounting for ocean economic activityOECD Science, Technology and Industry Working Papers
