OECD Maritime Policy

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS
Sustainable ocean economy

Context
Issues at stake
The ocean may be a new economic frontier (OECD, 2016) but foremost it is a shared global resource.
Ocean-related industries in many countries have expanded with insufficient consideration for the
environment, risking the natural resources and essential marine ecosystem services on which economies
and the well-being of people depend.
The health of marine ecosystems is a key issue. Marine biodiversity sustains life in the ocean and life on
land; marine biodiversity, composed of species, ecosystems and genetic diversity, provides critical
ecosystem services like food and oxygen production and carbon sequestration. Biodiversity loss reduces
the ability of marine ecosystems to provide these services and their capacity to recover from climatic or
biogeochemical changes (Worm et al., 2006). The most important pressures on marine biodiversity are
resource over-exploitation, pollution, habitat disturbance, climate change and invasive alien species
(Halpern et al., 2017; OECD 2017a).
Closely linked is the well-being of people and the resilience of coastal communities to risks. Sea level
rise, extreme weather events, over-extraction of marine resources, over-tourism, and air and water
pollution from ocean industries and land-based sources can threaten the health, infrastructure and
livelihoods of coastal populations.
It is also necessary to monitor progress in improving the environmental and resource productivity of
the ocean economy; that is, are we becoming more efficient in using ocean resources? What are the key
dependencies of our economies on ocean resource utilisation?
We need to better understand how households, industries and governments are responding to these
challenges. For example, achieving environmental objectives cost-efficiently will require considerable
innovation, a key driver of productivity gains and economic growth that may create new business
opportunities and markets. Monitoring and highlighting economic opportunities like those created
through innovation and investment directed at ocean sustainability can help motivate and accelerate the
necessary changes.
How are policy-makers responding to these challenges? Policy responses take many different forms (in
part because pressures on ocean ecosystems vary locally and regionally). For example, the designation of
marine protected areas can help conserve and restore habitats and species and ensure that marine and
coastal ecosystems continue to provide storm and erosion protection, carbon storage, fish, and recreation
and tourism opportunities.
Taxes, subsidies and other policy instruments provide important market signals that can influence the
behaviour of producers and consumers. They can help incorporate environmental costs and benefits into
the decisions of households and businesses, by changing the price of a product or service. They can be a
cost-effective way to achieve environmental goals, such as limiting air emissions from maritime shipping,
reducing discharges of contaminated water from vessels, encouraging sustainable management of marine
resources, and reducing noise from transport and energy installations that can harm marine ecosystems.

• 1 • Exported on 25 May 2023 – OECD iLibrary – © OECD 2023
Some government measures may also be harmful for the marine environment and economically wasteful.
For example, policies supporting offshore oil & gas extraction and the consumption of fossil fuels in marine
transport; or policies encouraging unsustainable fishing undermine climate and biodiversity policy goals
and increase the overall cost of the necessary transition, such as delineated in the Nationally Determined
Contributions (NDCs).
Policy challenges
◦ Ensure the effective conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity, for example, by
strengthening the degree of protection of species, habitats and ecosystems, sustainably managing fish
stocks and resource extraction, eliminating illegal and unregulated fishing, and reforming
environmentally harmful subsidies. See the Environment at a Glance: Biodiversity chapter for more
information.
◦ Strengthen international and regional co-operation to protect the marine environment (e.g. pursue the
ratification and implementation of international agreements on the prevention of marine pollution such
as the 1996 Protocol to the London Dumping Convention as well as the Anti-fouling Systems and Ballast
Water Conventions) and improve capacity to respond to incidents involving pollution by oil and
hazardous and noxious substances.
◦ Accelerate ocean economy decarbonisation: Implement national and international low-carbon strategies
and further decouple greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from economic growth, increase the share of
renewable sources in the energy supply (in which marine renewable energy plays a role), reduce energy
intensity by adopting energy-efficient technologies in manufacturing, transportation and consumer
appliances, and phase-out support for fossil fuels. See the Environment at a Glance: Climate chapter for
more information.
◦ Adapt coastal communities to the risks from rising sea levels, extreme weather events and other natural
hazards (and technological accidents triggered by natural hazards). As appropriate for local contexts,
countries should engage with those directly at risk, adopt long-term plans for coastal areas which take
future changes into account, implement maritime spatial planning in coherence with coastal zone
management, and protect existing coastal ecosystems that can serve as natural buffers.
◦ Ensure material resources and waste are well managed, for example, by enacting pro-circular economy
policies, improving resource efficiency (e.g. efforts to reduce single-use plastics or to promote
environmentally sound ship breaking and recycling), and integrating policies on water, materials,
product and chemicals management to address the issue of microplastics, marine plastic litter and other
pollutants of concern (e.g. nitrogen). See the Environment at a Glance: Waste chapter for more
information.
◦ Encourage innovation and mobilise private finance at the scale needed to support these challenges,
notably through public (co-)financing that avoids crowding out private efforts and suitably designed
policy instruments that provide stringent, flexible and predictable signals to innovators and investors
(e.g. OECD, 2011). Removing barriers to market entry and exit is also key.
Ocean-relevant policies cover a wide range of economic sectors and environmental domains. In order for
them to be effective, it is essential that they are aligned with other environmental and climate policy
priorities and coherent with economic and sectoral policies (e.g. through the use of market-based
instruments, such as carbon pricing, and implementing environmental fiscal reforms). It is also important
to systematically review the opportunities and threats to marine ecosystems posed by policy measures in
other sectors (e.g. fisheries, agriculture, transport, tourism) and to integrate the sustainable use of
resources and conservation of ecosystem services into tools such as strategic environmental assessments.

Measuring progress and performance

Reliable, timely and internationally harmonised data on the state of marine ecosystems and pressures
thereon, and the benefits generated for human well-being, are required to support policy-making directed
at a sustainable ocean economy. Monitoring the various policy instruments and government measures in
place is likewise necessary for policy assessment and to support policy reform.
Progress towards a sustainable ocean economy can be assessed against domestic and international goals
and commitments where these exist. All indicators presented here are relevant to Sustainable
Development Goal 14:
Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development.
This page includes selected sustainable-ocean-related indicators published by the OECD and partner
organisations; however, environmental and economic ocean data are immature compared to the terrestrial
domain, and considerable data collection and integration challenges remain in order to comprehensively
monitor progress towards a sustainable ocean economy. In particular, there is a need to fill data gaps
related to measuring and monitoring the status of marine ecosystem services and to strengthen their
valuation to identify priorities and address potential trade-offs.
Indicator groups
This work draws inspiration from the OECD Green Growth indicators framework (OECD, 2017b), which was
developed to improve our understanding of issues at the interface of the environment and the economy in
an integrated manner. The following main indicator groups are presented:
◦ Natural capital of the ocean

◦ The environmental dimension of well-being and resilience
◦ Environmental and resource productivity
◦ Economic opportunities from pursuing ocean sustainability
◦ Policy responses directed at ocean sustainabilitySocio-economic context
Natural capital of the ocean
Key messages
◦ Marine biodiversity is in a perilous state. Many ecosystems (particularly coral ecosystems) and species
are threatened and populations are declining. Practically all indicators give cause for alarm.
◦ Coastal ecosystems are under increased pressure from urbanisation with OECD coastal areas at least
twice as developed than inland areas.
◦ Continued degradation of ocean natural capital poses a threat to global ecosystem stability and already
has perceptible repercussions on human well-being and prospects for sustainable development.
◦ Regularly assessing the status of individual fish stocks is essential to sustainable fisheries management.
Latest available figures show that 18% of assessed fish stocks reported to the OECD Review of Fisheries
2022 fall below sustainability standards and in these cases countries should build these stocks back for
example by encouraging fisheries manager review their current management action. Increasing the
number and frequency of stock assessments is important for maintaining the natural capital of the
ocean.
Main trends and recent developments
Many marine fish species are threatened in countries covered by OECD data, and other state and trend
indicators of global marine biodiversity show cause for concern and are often dire. For example, the

average population size of marine birds, mammals, reptiles and fish monitored by the Living Planet Index
approximately halved since 1970 (WWF, 2015); the IUCN Red List Index which tracks aggregate extinction
risk for taxa that have been adequately assessed shows the prospects for corals worsening rapidly
(Carpenter et al., 2008); and the IUCN Red List database of threatened species lists close to 9% of marine
animals and plants with a risk of extinction. For example, 14% of the fishes and 30% of corals are
threatened, i.e. critically endangered, endangered or vulnerable (IUCN, 2022).
Coastal areas in the OECD are considerably more built-up than other areas and remaining unbuilt land
in coastal areas is being developed faster than inland. In many countries, coastal areas (within 10 km) are
more than twice as built-up on average compared to the country as a whole. Land development, along with
agricultural land uses, potentially increases pressures on coastal ecosystems via organic (nutrients like
nitrogen and phosphorous), inorganic (e.g. industrial chemicals, pesticides) and debris (e.g. microplastics
and plastic litter) water pollution as well as via habitat loss and disturbance.
Healthy fish stocks are fundamental for maximising sustainable catch, or its value, which itself is key to
providing food-security, jobs and incomes in the long-term. Healthy stocks are also vital for maintaining
aquatic biodiversity, and the provision of ecosystem services on which several other sectors of the ocean
economy rely (OECD, 2022b).
According to the most recent stock assessments undertaken in 32 countries, 64% of assessed stocks are in
good health, 18% fall below sustainability standards, and for another 18%, assessments are not conclusive
and their health status remains undetermined (OECD, 2022b).
Indicators
Threatened marine fish species

Number
2020
150
100
50
0
Lithuania
Latvia
Chile
Poland
Finland
Mexico
Estonia
Spain
Netherlands
Slovenia
Norway
France
Colombia
Belgium
Greece
Australia
Japan
Ireland
Sweden
Germany
Italy
Canada
Brazil
© OECD
Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

OECD - Total - Urbanisation in coastal areas
Built-up area within 10km of coast as share of land within 10km of the coast, %
Built-up area, all land, as share of all land, %
0
2000
2014
© OECD
Urbanisation in coastal areas

2014
30
20
10
0
Iceland
Chile
Canada
Costa Rica
Colombia
Norway
New Zealand
Mexico
Latvia
Estonia
Australia
Finland
Ireland
World
OECD
Greece
Sweden
Türkiye
Lithuania
Poland
Slovenia
European Union
United States
United Kingdom
Germany
Spain
Korea
Denmark
Italy
Portugal
France
Japan
Netherlands
Belgium
Israel
© OECD

Figure 0.4 Reported biological status of all assessed fish stocks: National level
Note: This figure presents the status of assessed stocks as reported to the OECD by individual countries and economies (the total
number of which is provided in parentheses). Favourable and unfavourable status refer to the stock’s biological situation (signalling
a stock was found to be within all limit reference points or outside one or more limit reference point). The status of stocks for which
the assessment was not conclusive is reported as undetermined. The degree to which harvested stocks are assessed (and reported
upon) was not reported by countries and varies significantly.
Source: OECD (2022), OECD Review of Fisheries 2022, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/9c3ad238-en
Comparability and interpretation

Threatened species include those listed as vulnerable, endangered and critically endangered. Data on
threatened species are available with varying degrees of completeness. The number of species known or
assessed does not always accurately reflect the number of species in existence, and the definitions that
should follow IUCN standards are applied with varying degrees of rigour in countries. Historical data are
generally not comparable or not available. For many of the incompletely evaluated species groups,
assessment efforts have focused on species that are likely to be threatened; therefore any percentage of
threatened species reported for these groups would be heavily biased (that is, the % threatened species
would likely be an overestimate). For some countries, data include extinct species. Not all species are
monitored, in which case their status is unknown.
For further details, see the metadata in the source database listed below under Data source.
Percentage of fish stocks assessed must be studied carefully as they are dependent on the number of
stocks assessed and reported on. Stock assessments are done using biological sustainability standards (i.e.
limit reference points, typically defined in terms of biomass or mortality thresholds) and higher
management standards (i.e. target reference points, typically aimed at optimising catch value or volume

under sustainability constraints). Stocks in good health are defined as those that meet all assigned
sustainability standards. Stocks that fall below sustainability standards are those below one or more limit
reference points. Stocks with an undetermined status are those where an assessment was attempted but
uncertainty in the results prevented a determination from being made.
Environmental and resource productivity

Key messages
◦ CO2 emissions from OECD international marine bunkers reached their highest point in 2007 before the
Great Financial Crisis and were on a decreasing trend thereafter. They have been increasing again since
2014 to reach a level similar to that observed in the mid-1990s. In 2020, the emissions are close to 225
million tonnes of CO2, their lowest level since 1990 due to the drop in international trade following the
coronavirus pandemic.
◦ OECD international marine bunker CO2 emissions have on average been a little over 2% of the total
emissions from domestic fuel combustion plus international aviation and marine bunkers since 1990.
The share of CO2 emissions from international marine bunkers over total emissions follows business
cycles. They were at their highest in 2007, then decreased until 2014, and started to increase again since
then. As is to be expected, emissions from international marine trade are large compared to domestic
emissions in transit countries.
Emissions from international marine bunkers from OECD shipping generally decreased both in level of
CO2 emitted and share of total domestic emissions following the Great Financial Crisis until 2014, and
increased again since then. The decrease has two main causes: one is the link between international travel
and business cycles, the other is driven by long-term efficiency gains. More information is required to fully
capture efficiency changes in international shipping. Maritime shipping emissions account for a significant
share of global greenhouse gas emissions. OECD international marine bunker CO2 emissions are a little
over 2% of the total emissions. Total emissions are understood as the sum of domestic emissions coming
from fuel, plus international aviation and marine bunkers. Emissions from international marine trade are
large compared to domestic emissions in transit countries such as the Netherlands and Belgium. This
disconnect between domestic and international emissions highlights the importance of addressing
emissions from marine bunkers through cooperative global action.
Measurement challenges exist on air and water emissions from international maritime transport and how
they relate to economic performance of the industry, in part due to a lack of established accounting
methodologies on how such emissions should be allocated to countries (under the SEEA). There is also a
dearth of internationally harmonised data on waste generation, ballast water and brine discharges, oil spills
as well as land-based plastic emissions and nutrient loading into the ocean. On-going work (including at
the OECD) seeks to address these data gaps, for example using microdata on distance travelled and
categories of ships travelling.

Indicators
OECD - Total - International marine bunker CO₂ emissions
International marine bunker CO2 emissions, thousand tonnes

400k
300k
200k
100k
0
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
© OECD
International marine bunker CO₂ emissions as share of total emissions

Share of emissions from fuel combustion and international bunkers, %
2019
30
20
10
0
Czech Republic
Hungary
Luxembourg
Slovak Republic
Costa Rica
Switzerland
Austria
Poland
Canada
Chile
Colombia
Mexico
Australia
Germany
Türkiye
Ireland
Japan
United States
Norway
Israel
France
United Kingdom
World
OECD
Finland
Italy
New Zealand
Korea
Slovenia
Lithuania
Estonia
Portugal
Denmark
Iceland
Spain
Latvia
Greece
Sweden
Netherlands
Belgium
© OECD


The total emissions denominator used in the figure above is the sum of emissions from fuel combustion,
emissions from international aviation bunkers and emissions from international marine bunkers (allocated
to countries based on ports of departure).
Economic opportunities from pursuing ocean sustainability

Key messages
◦ Public budgets for ocean-related renewable energy research, development and demonstration (RD&D) is
strongly fluctuating from one year to another. It remains small in overall RD&D public budgets
considering the new frontier that the ocean represents. At USD 200 million in 2021 ( half the budget of
2019) , public budgets for ocean-related renewable energy technology research, development and
demonstration are a modest share of total energy RD&D budgets in most countries (under 1.5% on
average across OECD).
◦ Technological innovation directed at ocean sustainability is strongly concentrated in a small number of
OECD countries that account for almost all relevant inventions, including Korea, the USA and Japan. Such
innovation increased four-fold between 2000 and 2010, but it decreased more than two-fold between
2010 and 2019.
Ocean-related renewable energy public RD&D spending (including tidal, wave, salinity gradient and
offshore wind energy) is small compared to overall RD&D public budgets. Ocean related RD&D has been on
an increasing trend both in volume and share since the onset of the Great Financial Crisis in 2007,
reflecting the growing importance of the ocean at the global level in addressing climate change. However,
this increase stopped in the face of the COVID-19 sanitary crisis. Indeed, it reached its highest point in
2019, when the amount allocated for ocean renewable energy RD&D totalled 398 million USD in OECD
economies, representing 2.75% of total public RD&D budget. In 2021, ocean-related RD&D reached 208
million USD, and its share in total public RD&D was at its lowest point in five years at 1.37%, half of that
observed in 2019. Ocean RD&D budgets are highly concentrated within a handful of countries. Japan,
France, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands are regularly among the top OECD spending countries.
Offshore wind energy is the biggest component among the four components studied and has been
receiving between a half and close to 90% of total ocean renewable energy RD&D since 2016. These trends
indicate governments’ growing focus to exploit the ocean energy potential in an effort to reach clean
energy targets declared in the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). However, the negative
biodiversity impacts of ocean energy are not yet sufficiently taken into account (e.g. marine noise pollution).
Inventive activity in ocean-related environmental technologies (ENVTECH), measured using patented
inventions, has grown over time, but decreased more recently. Following ten years of continuous growth
between 2000 and 2010 with a three-fold increase, the last decade saw a reversing trend as the number of
patented inventions halved between 2010 and 2019. High-quality inventions were cut by three. Three
quarters of ocean ENVTECH inventions originate in OECD countries in 2019 – especially in the United
States, Korea and Japan, followed by a number of European countries. The technology domains
contributing the most to patent applications are ocean renewable energy generation and climate change
mitigation and adaption in aquaculture and aquafarming. The latter technology domain has been more
stable in terms of patent applications. On the contrary, innovation directed at ocean pollution abatement
has decreased the strongest. For a handful of countries, development of ocean-related technologies
represents an increasing share of overall inventive output, reflecting a high degree of specialisation. In

2019, this share is 7.3% in Norway, 4.5% in Iceland, 3% in Chile, 1.8% in New Zealand and 1.5% in Denmark,
well above the OECD average of 0.3%.
Indicators
OECD - Total - Ocean-related renewable energy public RD&D budgets
All ocean and offshore energy (offshore wind + ocean energy) RD&D, million USD 2021 PPP
500
400
300
200
100
0
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
© OECD
Ocean-related renewable energy public RD&D

Million USD
2021
75
50
25
0
Austria (2020)
Czech Republic
Finland (2020)
Hungary
Italy (2019)
Korea
New Zealand (2020)
Portugal
Slovak Republic
United States
Estonia
Brazil (2020)
Lithuania
Poland
Switzerland
Australia
Türkiye
Spain (2020)
Mexico
Canada
Denmark
Belgium
Ireland (2020)
Sweden
Norway
Netherlands (2020)
Germany
France (2020)
United Kingdom (2020)
European Union (2019)
Japan
© OECD

Ocean-related energy RD&D as share of total public budget for energy RD&D
Percentage
2021
20
10
0
Slovak Republic
Czech Republic
Italy (2019)
Finland (2020)
Austria (2020)
United States
Portugal
Korea
Estonia
Hungary
New Zealand (2020)
Lithuania
Poland
Switzerland
Australia
Canada
OECD
Belgium
Türkiye
Spain (2020)
France (2020)
Denmark
Germany
European Union (2019)
Sweden
Japan
United Kingdom (2020)
Norway
Mexico
Netherlands (2020)
Ireland (2020)
© OECD
Innovation in selected ocean-related technologies

2019
Ocean renewable energy inventions, number

Ocean pollution abatement inventions, number
Climate change mitigation inventions in maritime fishing and aquaculture, number
Climate change mitigation inventions in maritime transport, number
Coastal adaptation inventions, number
Desalination inventions, number
500
250
0
Costa Rica
Czech Republic
Luxembourg
Mexico
Slovenia
Hungary
Greece
Iceland
Austria
Portugal
Belgium
Switzerland
Colombia
Ireland
Finland
Türkiye
Poland
New Zealand
Australia
Israel
Sweden
Chile
Spain
Canada
Italy
Netherlands
Denmark
United Kingdom
France
Germany
Norway
Japan
United States
Korea
© OECD

Share of ocean-related ENVTECH technologies in all technologies

Percentage
2019
10
0
Czech Republic
Switzerland
Japan
Austria
Germany
Belgium
United States
Mexico
Canada
Poland
Türkiye
Israel
Slovak Republic (2018)
Sweden
World
OECD
Slovenia
France
Italy
Finland
Australia
Hungary
United Kingdom
Netherlands
Ireland
Greece
Korea
Luxembourg
Spain
Portugal
Costa Rica
Estonia (2018)
Denmark
Colombia
New Zealand
Chile
Iceland
Norway
© OECD

The decrease in reported public funding for ocean-related renewable energy RD&D following 2015 may
reflect data quality issues, as official RD&D data for the United States is absent post-2015 and is estimated
by the IEA as ‘0’ for the period 2015-2019. Prior to this period, the United States accounted for a large
share of the OECD ocean-related renewable energy RD&D budget. European Union refers to the budget
under Horizon-2020 and not to the sum of national budgets of member states.
Policy responses directed at ocean sustainability

Key messages
◦ Marine protected areas (MPAs) have consistently expanded in recent years and now cover 22% of OECD
exclusive economic zones (EEZ).
◦ Economic instruments directed at ocean sustainability exist in most countries and most often take the
form of taxes. Around 156 ocean-related environmental policy instruments have been identified in OECD
countries.
◦ Revenue from environmentally related taxes in the ocean economy is a small share of total
environmentally related tax revenues (0.6%) in OECD countries. It has been slightly declining in the last
decade compared it its highest level observed in 2008 (0.7%).
◦ Fossil fuel support measures in the ocean economy are common and in place in most countries. The 120
measures identified primarily benefit fossil fuel consumers except for some major fossil-fuel producing
countries where they mainly benefit producers.
◦ Illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing is a serious threat to fisheries and fisheries-dependent
communities that impairs the development of a sustainable ocean economy. Overall, the up-take of best
practices is highest for port state measures (the average indicator scores 0.83 for all respondents) and
for vessel registration and authorisation to operate in the EEZ (average scores are 0.81 for both). At the

other end of the spectrum, market measures are the least widely used across respondents (with an
average score of 0.64).
Since the year 2000, OECD countries overall have considerably expanded marine protected area
networks; 22% of OECD marine area (exclusive economic zone) are designated protected in 2022 and
most countries have some system in place (however, establishing effective management plans for MPAs
and allocating adequate resources to implement them remains challenging). Protected areas explicitly
designated with IUCN management categories Ia, Ib, II, or III (approximately ‘marine reserves’ insofar that
commercial fishing or other extractive activities are generally restricted) are less frequently used,
accounting for a mere 5.5% of OECD EEZ (however, their adoption by the United States and Australia
accounts for virtually all of this; in most countries they are rarely used). Marine coastal areas are about as
likely to be protected as non-coastal areas: 23% of OECD and 18% of world marine areas within 10km of the
coast are designated protected. However, protection for the immediate shore is greater– close to 30% of
OECD land area within 1km of the coast is protected (compared to around 16% for OECD terrestrial areas
generally). Marine protected areas are rarely established on the high seas; only 0.5% of the global ocean
beyond national jurisdiction is designated protected.
The number of countries with economic (market-based) instruments targeted at ocean sustainability
has increased notably over time. By 2021, 70 countries had introduced ocean-related instruments, up from
53 in 1994 (according to data reported to OECD PINE database). Among these, taxes are the most
common instrument type (both across countries and over time). More than 51 countries have introduced
ocean-related taxes (such as taxes on fisheries, maritime transportation or marine pollution) and more
taxes have been introduced every year than any other instrument type. Even though most ocean-related
instruments are taxes, the share of tradable permit systems is highest in the ocean domain (more than in
any other environmental domain). Ocean-related tradable permit systems include, for example, individual
fishing quotas (Australia, Estonia, Iceland, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States), transferable
vessel quotas (Spain) and territorial user rights (Mexico and Chile).
Ocean-related fees and charges have been introduced in at least 42 countries, with examples such as
entrance fees to national parks, fees on fishing licenses, charges on sewage discharge into the ocean (e.g.
in the Great Barrier Reef area in Australia) and various non-compliance fines. Environmentally motivated
subsidies relevant for the ocean have been reported in at least 19 countries. Examples include feed-in
tariffs for offshore wind, tide and wave power generation (Argentina, Canada, Denmark, France, Korea, the
United Kingdom) and conservation grants to preserve marine biodiversity (Sweden).
In the OECD area, ocean-sustainability-related taxes raised USD 5.0 billion in 2021, a level which has
remained broadly stable since 2000 (despite the growing number of such taxes implemented). The share of
ocean-related tax revenue in total Environmentally Related Tax Revenue (ERTR) is decreasing, from 0.68% in
2000 to 0.62% in 2021. Pollution and transport dominate the tax base, accounting for 36% each of ocean-
related tax revenue in 2021. Revenue from taxes on ocean resources (e.g. fishing taxes) raise 12% of ocean
ERTR, while energy taxes (e.g. fuel for maritime transport) raise 16% of ocean-related revenue.
A large number of ocean-related fossil fuel support measures are in effect with over 120 measures
identified in 31 countries (of the 51 countries covering the OECD, G20 and European Union Eastern
Partnership economies). Fossil-fuel producing countries (e.g., Brazil, Norway, the United Kingdom, and the
United States) mostly support offshore extraction and general services via measures such as preferential
tax treatment for entities with offshore oil & gas extraction; research and exploration activities; port
infrastructure upgrades for increased fossil fuel trade capacity; and capacity building on decommissioning
activities. Other countries that are mainly consumers of fossil fuels tend to divide their ocean-related

support between the fisheries & aquaculture and the transportation sectors (e.g. via preferential tax rates
on fuels used in fisheries & aquaculture or in maritime transport).
Illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing is a serious threat to fisheries and fisheries-dependent
communities that impairs the development of a sustainable ocean economy. The pressure on fish stocks
resulting from IUU fishing harms law-abiding fishers by creating unfair competition, reducing their
profitability and employment opportunities throughout the value chain. It can also affect revenues from
other activities that depend on fish resources, such as tourism activities related to recreational fishing or
marine wildlife watching. When replacing legal activities, IUU fishing also deprives countries of the
associated fiscal revenues. This is why, this indicator has to be studied in the context of the other indicators
gathered in the Sustainable Ocean Economy database. More information about the results, the regulation
in place and policy solutions can be found in (OECD, 2020c).
Indicators
Figure 0.12 Uptake of best policies and practices against illegal, unreported and
unregulated fishing, 2018
Indicator scores range between 0 and 1, with increasing scores indicating higher levels of adoption and
implementation of the measures covered by each indicator
Source: OECD (2020), OECD Review of Fisheries 2020, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/7946bc8a-en.

OECD - Total - Share of marine area designated protected
Total protected area within 1km of coastline (both terrestrial and marine) as share of 1km buffer area, %
Total protected area within 10km of coastline (both terrestrial and marine) as share of 10km buffer area, %
Total marine protected areas as share of exclusive economic zone, %
40
30
20
10
0
2000
2005
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
© OECD
Extent of marine protected area coverage

2020
Marine protected area designated with IUCN management objectives I-III which generally preclude commercial fishing a…
Marine protected area designated with IUCN management objectives IV-VI or with no management category provided, …
100
50
40
30
20
10
0
Israel
Iceland
Norway
Korea
Japan
Ireland
Costa Rica
Canada
Greece
Portugal
Italy
Finland
Colombia
Spain
Sweden
Estonia
Latvia
Denmark
World
United States
OECD - Total
Lithuania
Mexico
Poland
Netherlands
United Kingdom
New Zealand
Belgium
Chile
Australia
Germany
France
Slovenia
© OECD

Number of ocean sustainability-related policy instruments by type

2020
Ocean-related taxes, number Ocean-related fees or charges, number

Environmentally motived ocean subsidies, number Ocean-related tradable permit systems, number
Ocean-related voluntary approaches, number Ocean-related deposit refund schemes, number
15
10
0
Belgium
Switzerland
Colombia
Czech Republic
Hungary
Japan
Luxembourg
Slovak Republic
Austria
Germany
Greece
Türkiye
Mexico
Poland
Portugal
Slovenia
Lithuania
Latvia
New Zealand
Ireland
Italy
Korea
Iceland
Israel
Netherlands
Denmark
Estonia
France
Norway
Sweden
Australia
United Kingdom
Finland
Canada
Chile
Spain
Costa Rica
United States
© OECD
OECD - Total - Number of ocean sustainability-related policy instruments

recorded in PINE database
Ocean-related policy instruments, number Ocean-related taxes, number

Ocean-related fees or charges, number Environmentally motived ocean subsidies, number
Ocean-related tradable permit systems, number Ocean-related voluntary approaches, number
Ocean-related deposit refund schemes, number
200
150
100
50
0
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
© OECD

Ocean sustainability-related tax revenue by tax base

% total ERTR, 2020
Energy Transport Pollution Resources
20
10
0
Austria
Belgium
Canada
Switzerland
Colombia
Costa Rica
Czech Republic
Greece
Hungary
Israel
Italy
Japan
Korea
Lithuania
Luxembourg
New Zealand
Poland
Portugal
Slovak Republic
Sweden
Türkiye
Australia
Germany
Ireland
Mexico
Slovenia
Finland
United Kingdom
Latvia
Denmark
Spain
Estonia
United States
Iceland
OECD - Total
OECD arithmetic average
Chile
France
Netherlands
Norway
© OECD
Ocean-related fossil-fuel support measures by beneficiary (CSE/PSE/GSSE)

2020
Ocean-related fossil-fuel support benefitting consumers (CSE) as share of ocean-related FFS, %

Ocean-related fossil-fuel support benefitting producers (PSE) as share of ocean-related FFS, %
Ocean-related fossil-fuel support benefitting general services (GSSE) as share of ocean-related FFS, %
100
0
Argentina
Belgium
Germany
Estonia
France
Greece
Korea
Lithuania
Latvia
Mexico
Portugal
Slovenia
Sweden
Türkiye
South Africa
Ireland
Israel
China (People's Republic of)
Italy
Norway
Canada
United States
Denmark
United Kingdom
Australia
Brazil
Japan
© OECD

Ocean-related fossil-fuel support measures by beneficiary (sectors)

2017-20
Ocean-related fossil-fuel support benefitting the hydrocarbon sector as share of ocean-related FFS, %
Ocean-related fossil-fuel support benefitting the transportation sector as share of ocean-related FFS, %
Ocean-related fossil-fuel support benefitting the agriculture and fisheries sector as share of ocean-related FFS, %
100
0
Australia
Brazil
Japan
United Kingdom
United States
Denmark
Norway
China (People's Republic of)
Italy
Canada
Israel
Ireland
Argentina
Belgium
Germany
Estonia
France
Greece
Korea
Lithuania
Latvia
Mexico
Portugal
Slovenia
Sweden
Türkiye
South Africa
© OECD

Protection designation does not guarantee that the area in question is effectively managed or
appropriately located; and empirical studies of the effectiveness of marine protected areas in conserving
biodiversity show mixed results (e.g. Dureuil et al., 2018). On a more technical level, the UNEP-WCMC’s
World Database of Protected Areas (WDPA) relies on regular submissions of data from countries and other
data providers; therefore, where these have not been provided the database is incomplete or outdated.
Furthermore, protected area attribute fields (such as the management category) can be missing or
incomplete so these measures are not perfectly reliable. Some designated marine protected areas target
only a narrow range of species (or even just a single species) through (e.g.) proscription of a particular
fishing technique, but without any special restrictions on other high-impact activities that may harm
biodiversity and are therefore only marginally more protected than other areas.
Care should be taken when interpreting the economic instrument counts. The existence of an instrument
does not guarantee its enforcement; moreover, the level of stringency might not be adequate for the
desired environmental outcome and the pattern of instrument types recorded in the OECD Policy
Instruments for the Environment (PINE) database may not be representative of all existing instruments.
The indicators on environmentally related taxes should not be used to assess the “environmental
friendliness” of the tax systems. For such analysis, additional information, describing the economic and
taxation structure of each country, is required. Moreover, a number of environmentally related taxes can
have important environmental impacts, even if they raise little (or no) revenue. In addition, revenue from
fees and charges, and from royalties related to resource management, is not included.
The proportion of benefitting fossil fuel support (FFS) consumption sectors is calculated using the median
of ocean-related FFS measures with active fund disbursements in 2018-2021. These disbursements
(targeting specific known fuels) are allocated to sectors using country-level sectoral energy consumption
data from the IEA’s World Energy Balances.

The data on illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing are based on a survey conducted by the
OECD in 2019. The answers from 33 countries and 26 OECD members were received and compiled. The
analysis is limited to the results of the survey. Individual country results should thus be interpreted
cautiously. More information, comparison between countries and over time can be found in (OECD, 2020c).
The survey includes questions covering six indicators. The choice of these indicators follow the
methodology used in Hutniczak, Delpeuch and Leroy (2019).
The environmental dimension of well-being and resilience

Forthcoming in Q4 2023
Socio-economic context
Key messages
◦ Physical volumes of OECD marine landings (fish catches) have declined in 2020 by more than 20% since
the 2000s and by 36% since 1995. The volume caught has stabilized since 2012. The current unit price
value of the catches remained broadly stable between 2000 and 2020 going up from 1.32 to 1.45 real
2015 USD/tonne.
◦ OECD marine aquaculture production increased in volume two-fold between 1995 and 2020. The current
unit price increased by close to 40%.
◦ Employment in the fishing sector in the OECD continuously decreased between 1995 and 2020, on
average by 1.5% every year. On the contrary, employment in the aquaculture sector increased over the
same period of time, on average by 1.2% every year. Employment in the processing sector has remained
steady in levels.
◦ The number of OECD fishing vessels of all sizes have declined by 1.2% on average every year. The unit
weight per vessels (average gross tonnage) increased slightly especially since 2007. It increased by 14%
between 2007 and 20218 from 7.4 to 8.2 tonnes per vessel.
◦ The value of exports and imports have increased on average by 3% year on year between 1995 and
2020. Most of the exports are directed towards other OECD countries. The EU and the USA remain the
world’s major importers of fish, while Asia the main exporter (OECD/FAO (2021)).
◦ Maritime transport dominates freight activity with more than 70% of all tonne-kilometres (ITF,
2021). The other modes of freight by order of importance are road and rail. In the OECD, coastal
shipping freight decreased by a little over 1% every year between 2000 and 2021. However, the People
Republic of China’s (hereafter, China) average yearly growth rate of 7% over the same period of time is
leading the growth of the sector. Marine container transport in OECD has increased consistently and is
now more than twice as large in tonnage and container number than in the early 2000s. In 2021, a year
after the start of COVID-19, the number of containers and the tonnage were back to their pre-pandemic
levels.
◦ Sea passenger tourism receipts (tourism “exports”) as a share of total tourism receipts spiked in the
follow-up of the pandemic. They are a small part of inbound tourism spending except for Estonia,
Finland, and Denmark where they represent respectively 15%, 7%,and 4% in 2021. Equivalent
expenditures (tourism “imports”) stagnated on the period 2000-19 and surged in 2020.
◦ About a quarter of the overall OECD population lives within 10km of the coast. This is of particular
concern considering the projected global mean sea level rise expected to reach between 0.43m to 0.84m
by 2100 relative to 1986-2005 (IPCC, 2019). Population living within 10km of the coast as a share of total
population is particularly high in Iceland (95%), Norway (75%), Denmark (67%), New Zealand (66%),
Greece (63%), Australia (59%), Estonia (53%) and Portugal (53%) [2015 figures]. Several non-OECD

economies are even more threatened by the sea level rise such as Kuwait, Qatar, Brunei, Guyana,
Panama and Belize.
Based on the currently available data, several notable trends are observed. OECD aquaculture production
has doubled in volume and tripled in real value since 1995. However, studying the impact of OECD
countries on the ocean is not sufficient. Non-OECD countries also have significant impacts on ocean
resources, in particular China which is the world’s largest producer in both the capture fisheries and the
aquaculture sectors. In 2020, China’s aquaculture production was 4.6 times that of all the OECD countries
combined. Likewise, although OECD fishing fleet per tonnage decreased continuously since 1995, China’s
fishing fleet tonnage increased over the same period of time and was in 2020 almost twice that of all OECD
combined. Another remarkable trend is the consistent increase in marine trade, which reached 239 million
containers handled by OECD ports in 2021, more than doubling the number of the early 2000s, and
recovering its pre-pandemic levels. This is equivalent to seven twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) every
second in OECD ports in 2021, compared to two TEUs every second in the early 1990s (reflecting economic
growth and an increase in global trade generally).
Box 1. Measurement challenges

This section presents contextual indicators such as population living in coastal areas, factor inputs of
selected ocean industries (labour, energy, produced capital) and their output (revenue, value added).
However, major information gaps persist, notably concerning internationally harmonised economic
and environmental statistics on ocean industries, e.g., value added, employment but also energy
consumption, air and water emissions, and use of other marine ecosystem services by industries such
as coastal and marine tourism, offshore energy, maritime transport or port activities. Collection and
availability of data on fisheries management and its sustainability is not well distributed geographically.
Some regions have very good data available, while for others the information is very poor in this
regard. Such information is needed to draw a more complete picture of the ocean economy and its
sustainability. The OECD and its international partners have been active in this area (e.g. OECD, 2016)
and work is on-going on developing ocean economic accounts consistent with the System of National
Accounts (SNA) as well as on developing ocean environmental accounts consistent with the System of
Environmental-Economic Accounting (SEEA).
In the meantime, ocean industries remain only partially covered in the OECD database. Data on
selected ocean-related activities is presented, where available, noting that often little or no harmonised
data on the sustainability aspects of these sectors can be currently identified and presented.
Addressing these information gaps is important so that the sustainability of these sectors and
industries can be assessed. As accounting methodologies are developed and internationally
harmonised data become available, more data and indicators will be included under the various
thematic headings above.

Indicators
OECD - Total - Marine landings volume
Total marine landings, all species, thousand tonnes

40k
30k
20k
10k
0
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
© OECD
OECD - Total - Aquaculture production volume
Total aquaculture production, marine and partly-marine species, thousand tonnes

10k
7.5k
5k
2.5k
0
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
© OECD

OECD - Total - Employment in fishing and aquaculture
People employed in fishing sectors excluding inland fisheries, total by occupation rate, thousands
People employed in fishery processing sector (marine and inland), total by occupation rate, thousands
People employed in aquaculture sector (marine and inland), total by occupation rate, thousands
1500
1000
500
0
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
© OECD
OECD - Total - Fishing fleet
Gross tonnage of fishing vessels of all sizes, thousand tonnes

8k
6k
4k
2k
0
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
© OECD

OECD - Total - Trade in fisheries products
Total imports of fisheries products, million USD Total exports of fisheries products, million USD
125k
100k
75k
50k
25k
0
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
© OECD
OECD - Total - Marine freight transport (containers handled by ports)

Twenty-foot equivalent unit (TEU)
Total maritime container transport, number of TEUs, thousands
300k
250k
200k
150k
100k
50k
0
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
© OECD

OECD - Total - Trade in ocean-related tourism services
International sea passenger transport receipts as share of total international tourism receipts, %
International sea passenger transport expenditure as share of total international tourism expenditure, %
1.25
0.75
0.5
0.25
0
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
© OECD
Coastal population
Population living within 10km of the coast as share of total population, %
2015
100
50
0
Slovak Republic
Czech Republic
Luxembourg
Austria
Hungary
Switzerland
Poland
Belgium
Germany
Slovenia
Lithuania
Colombia
Mexico
Costa Rica
France
World
United States
Latvia
Chile
OECD
Canada
Italy
United Kingdom
Netherlands
Türkiye
Spain
Korea
Finland
Israel
Japan
Sweden
Ireland
Portugal
Estonia
Australia
Greece
New Zealand
Denmark
Norway
Iceland
© OECD

These observations cover OECD member countries for which data are available; global trends may differ.
The reported OECD aggregates do not generally cover all members (either because of incomplete data or
because the indicator does not apply (e.g. landlocked countries). In general, around 30 of 37 OECD
members are included (depending on topic and year) with the exception of tourism receipts and revenues
where data is only available for around 20 OECD members. For indicators on flows, aggregated values

include flows between member countries. When calculating aggregates where country-data-years are
missing, missing values are interpolated where possible or else back-and-forward filled using the closest
valid value. Sometimes this involves filling data several years from the nearest value so some caution in
interpreting the OECD value is warranted. Refer to the OECD Sustainable Ocean Economy Database metadata
for comprehensive information.
Marine freight measures freight passing through ports therefore for each departure is there is also at least
one corresponding arrival elsewhere. Consequently, individual freight items will often be counted more
than once.
Exports (imports) for the OECD as a whole is the sum of exports (imports) of all OECD member countries. As
such, exports (imports) between OECD countries are counted as non-zero. The statistic does not inform on
the relative autonomy of OECD as an entity with regards to the rest of the world.
Glossary
Aquaculture production: Aquaculture is the farming of aquatic organisms including fish, molluscs,
crustaceans and aquatic plants. Farming implies some form of intervention in the rearing process to
enhance production, such as regular stocking, feeding, protection from predators, etc. Farming also
implies individual or corporate ownership of the stock being cultivated.
Fish, crustaceans, molluscs, and all other aquatic organisms are classified according to the FAO
International Standard Statistical Classification of Aquatic Animals and Plants (ISSCAAP). In this dataset, only
species considered to be marine or partly marine are selected. The included species list can be found in the
ocean database metadata.
Built-up area: “Built-up" is defined as the presence of buildings (roofed structures). Coastal area is defined
as the area within 1km or within 10km of the coast.
Employment in fishing: Commercial, industrial and subsistence fishers, operating in freshwater, brackish
water, and marine waters in economically inspired efforts to catch and land any of the great variety of
aquatic animals and plants and also people working on fish farms, hatcheries, processing, and employed in
shellfish culture operations.
Fishing fleet: Vessels engaged in catching operations only.
Fishing stocks: A fish stock is considered assessed when management objectives were set and stock
status was recently quantitatively assessed with respect to the associated reference points.
Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing: the “International Plan of Action to Prevent, Deter
and Eliminate Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated Fishing (IPOA-IUU)” describes IUU fishing as follows:
- Illegal fishing refers to activities conducted in a country’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) in contravention
of its laws and regulations as well as to fishing in international waters in violation of that country’s flag state
law and regulations related to its obligations under the international treaties and regional fisheries
management organisations (RFMO) convention arrangements to which it is party;
- Unreported fishing refers to fishing activities that have not been reported, or have been misreported, to
the relevant national authority or RFMO, in contravention of the laws, regulations and reporting procedures
of that country or organisation. This can occur both within EEZs and on the high seas (Areas beyond
national jurisdiction - ABNJ);
- Unregulated fishing refers to fishing activities in areas or of fish stocks where there are no national,
regional or international conservation or management measures applicable to a particular fishery or
fishing vessel. Unregulated fishing can occur in an unmanaged fishery within an EEZ or on the high seas by

vessels without nationality, or by vessels flying the flag of a country that is not a party to international
conventions or a relevant RFMO
International marine bunker CO2 emissions: International marine bunkers contains emissions from
fuels burned by ships of all flags that are engaged in international navigation. The international navigation
may take place at sea, on inland lakes and waterways, and in coastal waters. Consumption by ships
engaged in domestic navigation is excluded. The domestic/international split is determined on the basis of
port of departure and port of arrival, and not by the flag or nationality of the ship. Consumption by fishing
vessels and by military forces is also excluded.
Marine freight transport: Containers are a special box to carry freight, strengthened and stackable and
allowing horizontal or vertical transfers. Swap bodies are excluded.
Coastal shipping or short sea shipping is the movement of cargo by sea between ports situated within a
relatively narrow geographical area. Included in such movements would be ferry and feeder traffic. For
Europe, short sea shipping would consist of the movement of cargo by sea between ports situated in
Europe as well as between ports in Europe and ports situated in non-European countries having a coastline
on the enclosed seas bordering Europe.
Marine landings: Fish, crustaceans, molluscs and other aquatic invertebrates (and animals), residues and
seaweeds on a landed weight basis, i.e. the mass (or weight) of a product at the time of landing, regardless
of the state in which is landed (i.e. whole, gutted, filleted, meal, etc.). Data cover all industrial, artisanal and
subsistence fisheries, excluding aquaculture.
Ocean and offshore energy public RD&D budgets: Energy RD&D covers basic and applied research,
experimental development, and demonstration related to the production, storage, transportation,
distribution and use of all forms of energy. Shown here are data for the following ocean-related renewable
energy sectors:
Offshore wind RD&D activities which focus on the performance and the reliability of these technologies.
Ocean energy, including technologies that harness the physical properties of the ocean to generate
electricity from tidal energy, wave energy, and salinity gradient power. RD&D activities for this sector
includes the design and development of equipment and turbine technology, as well as the research on the
effect on marine life of ocean energy.
Ocean-sustainability-related inventions: The number of inventions (simple patent families) developed
by a country’s inventors, independent of the jurisdictions where a patent application has been registered
(i.e. all known patent families worldwide are considered). Patents in ocean-related ENVTECH technologies
represent only a small portion of overall patenting activity. Therefore, prior to data retrieval from a
worldwide patent database, a search strategy is used to identify the relevant patent documents using
common patent classification systems. For more details, see the metadata to the OECD Sustainable Ocean
Economy Database.
Ocean-sustainability-related policy instruments: Policy instruments such as taxes, fees and charges,
tradable permits, environmentally motivated subsidies, deposit refund schemes and voluntary approaches
directed at ocean sustainability. Examples include taxes on fishing, taxes on maritime transport, import
duties on vessels, fees on access to marine reserve parks, fishing licenses, coastal protection subsidies,
subsidies for offshore wind electricity generation, individual transferable quotas for fisheries, etc.
Data are extracted from the OECD Policy Instruments for the Environment (PINE) database (http://oe.cd/
pine). The PINE database, contains quantitative and qualitative information on over 3500 policy instruments
in 110 countries worldwide. Policy instruments are tagged into 13 environmental domains that represent

the focal issues (environmental externalities). Instruments can have both a direct and an indirect effect on
several environmental domains; however, only the domain to which the instrument has a direct effect is
considered. Ocean sustainability is the most recent domain added to the database. For more details, see
the metadata to the OECD Sustainable Ocean Economy Database
Ocean- sustainability-related tax revenue: Revenue raised from taxes and auctioning of tradable
permits directed at ocean sustainability. These include specific taxes on i) energy products for maritime
transport purposes; ii) maritime vessels and transport infrastructure (e.g. one-off or recurrent taxes on
ownerships and use of boats); iii) ocean pollution (e.g. discharges into the ocean); and iv) ocean-resource
extraction (e.g. fishing taxes, revenue from auctioning of individual transferable quotas for fisheries).
The information on taxes and the associated tax revenue is extracted from the OECD Policy Instruments for
the Environment (PINE) database (http://oe.cd/pine). The PINE database, contains quantitative and
qualitative information on over 3500 policy instruments in 110 countries worldwide. Policy instruments are
tagged into 13 environmental domains that represent the focal issues (environmental externalities).
Instruments can have both a direct and an indirect effect on several environmental domains; however, only
the domain to which the instrument has a direct effect is considered. Ocean sustainability is the most
recent domain added to the database. For more details, see the metadata to the OECD Sustainable Ocean
Economy Database.
Ocean-related fossil fuel support measures: Direct budgetary support and tax expenditures supporting
the production or consumption of fossil fuels. Following the OECD’s PSE-CSE framework the measures
benefitting fossil fuel producers are classified as the Producer Support Estimate (PSE) while those that
benefit individual fossil fuel consumers are classified under the Consumer Support Estimate (CSE). A third
category, the General Services Support Estimate (GSSE), is assigned for measures that do not currently
increase fossil fuel production and consumption but may do so in the future.
The OECD Inventory of Fossil Fuel Support Measures (http://oe.cd/fossil-fuels) identifies the type of fossil
fuels benefitted by each measure and presents a breakdown of the amount of support by assigning fuel
type tags. In cases where this breakdown is not available in official government sources, the OECD
performs data transformation procedure to allocate support to individual fuel tags according to the relative
value of production or consumption as calculated from the IEA’s World Energy Balances database. Note
that measures can benefit more than one type of fossil fuel at the same time and can thus receive multiple
fuel tags in this respect. For example, a measure granting lower sales tax rates for road transport fuels will
receive multiple fuel tags such as motor gasoline, diesel, LPG and natural gas.
Building on this methodology, an additional binary tag is developed for ocean-related government support
for fossil fuels. This tagging strategy is detailed in the metadata to the OECD Sustainable Ocean Economy
Database.
Protected area: Area of land or sea especially dedicated to the protection and maintenance of biological
diversity and of natural and associated cultural resources, and managed through legal or other effective
means. The data refer to the World Conservation Union (IUCN) management categories I-VI. National
classifications may differ. The data cover areas under the management categories:
◦ I (strict nature reserves and wilderness areas),

◦ II (national parks),
◦ III (natural monument or feature)
◦ IV (habitat or species management area),
◦ V (protected landscape or seascape) and

◦ VI (protected area with sustainable use of natural resources).

Areas nationally/internationally designated without any IUCN category assigned are also included. This
category includes regional and international designations such as the European Natura 2000 network.
In general, under the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea the EEZ of a country extends 200 nautical
miles from the coastline, or to the mid-point between coastlines where the EEZ of different countries would
otherwise overlap. Coastal area is here defined as the area within 1km or within 10km of the coast,
including the terrestrial shoreline.
Threatened species: The number of threatened species compared to the number of known or assessed
species. “Threatened” refers to the categories of “endangered”, “critically endangered” and “vulnerable”
species (i.e. species in danger of extinction and species soon likely to be in danger of extinction), as defined
by the IUCN.
Tourism receipts and expenditure – sea passengers: Passenger services cover the transport of people.
This category covers all services provided in the international transport of non-residents by resident
carriers (credit or international passenger transport receipts) (similar to exports) and that of residents by
non-resident carriers (debit or international passenger transport expenditure) (similar to imports).
Passenger services include fares and other expenditure related to the carriage of passengers, any taxes
levied on passenger services, and fares that are a part of package tours, cruise fares, rentals, charters, and
leases of vessels, aircraft, coaches, or other commercial vehicles with crews for the carriage of passengers.
Trade in fisheries products: Fishery products entering (imports) or leaving (exports) an economic
territory. Goods simply being transported through a country (goods in transit) or temporarily admitted or
withdrawn (except for goods for inward or outward processing) do not add to or subtract from the stock of
material resources of a country and are not included in the international merchandise trade statistics.
Fisheries products are classified according to the International Merchandise Trade Statistics, Concepts and
Definitions manual.
Data source
The immediate source of all data presented here is the OECD Sustainable Ocean Economy Database, a
synthetic database that brings relevant datasets from across the OECD and partner organisations together
in a single place:
OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://stats.oecd.org/index.a
spx?datasetcode=OCEAN
Original sources include:
◦ International Energy Agency (IEA): CO2 Emissions from Fuel Combustion, Detailed Country RD&D Budgets
◦ International Transport Forum (ITF): Freight Transport
◦ OECD Environment Statistics (Biodiversity, Land cover change, Protected areas, Environmentally related
tax revenue, Innovation in environment-related technologies).
◦ OECD Fisheries Statistics (Fish stocks, Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing, Marine landings,
Production from aquaculture, Employment in fisheries, Fishing fleet, Trade in products)
◦ OECD Green Growth Indicators
◦ OECD International Trade in Services Statistics
◦ OECD Inventory of Support Measures for Fossil Fuels
◦ OECD Policy Instruments for the Environment (PINE) Database.

References and further reading

Bahri, T. et al. (eds.) (2021), “Adaptive management of fisheries in response to climate change”, FAO
Fisheries and Aquaculture Technical Paper, No. 667, Food and Agriculture Organization, Rome, https://doi.org
/10.4060/cb3095en.
Barbier, E. (2017), “Marine ecosystem services”, Current Biology, Vol. 27/11, pp. R507-R510, https://doi.org/
10.1016/j.cub.2017.03.020.
Carpenter, K.E. et al. (2008), “One-third of reef-building corals face elevated extinction risk from climate
change and local impacts”, Science, Vol. 321/5888, http://doi.org/10.1126/science.1159196.
Costello, C. et al. (2016), “Global fishery prospects under contrasting management regimes”, Proceedings
of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 113/18, pp. 5125-5129, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.152042011
3.
Dureuil, M. et al. (2018), “Elevated trawling inside protected areas undermines conservation outcomes in a
global fishing hot spot”, Science, Vol. 362/6421, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aau0561.
Halpern, B.S. et al. (2017), “Drivers and implications of change in global ocean health over the past five
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ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

Sustainable ocean economy

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

Measuring progress and performance

◦ Natural capital of the ocean

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

Threatened marine fish species

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

OECD - Total - Urbanisation in coastal areas

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

Urbanisation in coastal areas

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

Comparability and interpretation

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

Environmental and resource productivity

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

OECD - Total - International marine bunker CO₂ emissions

International marine bunker CO2 emissions, thousand tonnes

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

International marine bunker CO₂ emissions as share of total emissions

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

Comparability and interpretation

Economic opportunities from pursuing ocean sustainability

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

OECD - Total - Ocean-related renewable energy public RD&D budgets

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

Ocean-related renewable energy public RD&D

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

Innovation in selected ocean-related technologies

Ocean renewable energy inventions, number

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

Share of ocean-related ENVTECH technologies in all technologies

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

Comparability and interpretation

Policy responses directed at ocean sustainability

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

OECD - Total - Share of marine area designated protected

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

Extent of marine protected area coverage

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

Number of ocean sustainability-related policy instruments by type

Ocean-related taxes, number Ocean-related fees or charges, number

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

OECD - Total - Number of ocean sustainability-related policy instruments

Ocean-related policy instruments, number Ocean-related taxes, number

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.

ENVIRONMENT AT A GLANCE INDICATORS

Ocean sustainability-related tax revenue by tax base

Energy Transport Pollution Resources

Source: OECD, "Sustainable Ocean Economy", OECD Environment Statistics (database), https://doi.org/10.1787/4c44ff65-en.