A new form of colonialism is threatening our oceans. Olivier Dubuquoy from the NGO ZEA advocates for their liberation.
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00:00Today, states have the opportunity to take over portions of the sea.
00:04So, in fact, they colonize the ocean.
00:14A state, it is enough that it is a portion of the sea, so of the coasts,
00:18and from that moment on, it can claim up to 200,000 sailors
00:22and also have what is called an extension of the continental plateau.
00:27And from there, all the resources that are in the water column
00:30as well as in the seabed, so all the mining resources,
00:34are the property of the states that have claimed these portions of the sea.
00:38And once they have recovered these portions of the sea,
00:41they can give operating permits to various mining companies,
00:47including oil and gas companies,
00:49which will, in the seabed, exploit all fossil fuels,
00:53so gas and oil.
00:55And this rush towards these fossil fuels is intensifying today.
01:00So we are in something quite phenomenal,
01:02since we are in a new form of colonization,
01:05both of spaces and resources,
01:07and it is in the process of shaking up all the scales
01:09from a global geopolitical point of view.
01:11That is why I think that the ocean is really, in the 21st century,
01:15the heart of all the issues,
01:17both from an ecological point of view,
01:19from a geopolitical point of view,
01:21but also from an energy point of view,
01:23because the ocean could really be the territory of the energy transition.
01:27And so we are really in a fairly critical period
01:32where few people are talking about the ocean in this term,
01:35whereas it will really become the main topic, I think, of the years to come.
01:40The ocean is the main climate regulator.
01:42The ocean is the space that is most threatened by oil and gas companies.
01:46So if we want to protect life on this planet,
01:48we have to succeed in protecting the ocean,
01:50which itself protects us,
01:52since it is the main climate regulator.
01:54We are based on this figure,
01:56which now dates back a little,
01:58which has been provided both by indigenous communities
02:00but also by the scientific community,
02:02that we have to leave 80% of fossil fuels in the ground
02:05if we do not want to accentuate this delaying bomb,
02:09which is global warming.
02:11So we started on the idea
02:13that if 80% of fossil fuels must remain in the ground,
02:17it is simply enough not to exploit the fossil fuels in the ocean,
02:21since we have already wreaked havoc on the earth.
02:23And here we find ourselves in a situation
02:25where, since the International Energy Agency
02:28recommends that to replace
02:30two-thirds of oil and gas production,
02:34it would be necessary to drill into the oceans,
02:36and more specifically into the Arctic.
02:38In parallel to this, we see that there is an agreement in Paris
02:41where everyone agrees that it is really necessary
02:43to limit global warming.
02:45We say to ourselves that we will have to act for this,
02:48and the best way is to simply block oil projects,
02:51since we need to gradually start
02:54and accelerate this transition,
02:57which we all call our wishes,
02:59to be able to move on to another model,
03:01because otherwise we run the disaster.