Context:

• World Oceans Day is celebrated on 8th June every year. The day was declared in 2008. June 8 was marked as it marks the day when it was first proposed in 1992 by Canada’s International Centre for Ocean Development (ICOD) and the Ocean Institute of Canada (OIC) at the Earth Summit, UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
• The Conference supported the implementation of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 14 of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development: Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development.

Background:

• The theme for the year 2019 is Gender and Oceans. The theme is to build greater ocean and gender literacy and to discover possible ways to promote gender equality in ocean-related activities such as marine scientific research, fisheries, labour at sea, migration by sea and human trafficking, as well as policy-making and management.
• The importance of gender equality is being recognized increasingly for the effective conservation and sustainable use of oceans, seas, and marine resources. Yet very little data and researches are available on these issues. Serious action towards gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls is still needed in all ocean-related sectors to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 5.