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To celebrate the United Nations World Ocean Day: "The ocean: life and livelihoods" our international non profit association invites you to participate in the Mundus maris Awards 2021 (MMA 2021) on how to appreciate the ocean and how it is our lifesource, supporting humanity and every other organism on Earth.   The year 2021 also marks the start of the UN Decade of the Ocean 2021-2030: Ocean Science for Sustainable Development.

In collaboration with four research projects with a geographical focus on Ghana/Gulf of Guinea, East Africa, the Indian Subcontinent, Indonesia as well as Peru this two-day FAO web seminar served to share interesting research results about production, processing, marketing, consumption and governance aspects of the value chain of small, low-cost fish. The prime concern was how to ensure that people with little purchasing power could retain access to healthy fish food rich in micronutrients.

The large research collaboration about small-scale fisheries titled "From vulnerability to viability" (V2V) is transdisciplinary and composed of some 100 partners, one of which is Mundus maris asbl. Approved in 2020, in-depth work is starting on 12 case studies, six in Africa and six in Asia. Sharing of research results within and well beyond the partnership is one of its features. This is why a series of monthly thematic webinars was started in January 2021. The inaugural session featured Rashid Sumaila,

Phasing out harmful fisheries subsidies has been on the agenda of the World Trade Organization (WTO) since 20 years. Doing so at long last by 2020 is target 6 of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 14 "Life under Water" adopted by the UN General Assembly in 2015. It's urgent as harmful subsidies are currently estimated at about USD 20.5 per year (1) fuelling overfishing and all kinds of illicit practices and affecting other SDGs negatively.

We are all connected to the ocean that provides us with every second breath we take, provides food, enjoyment, jobs, trade routes and more. To celebrate the Ocean and 10 years of Mundus maris the language of music invites us to navigate the seas and visit coastal cities, which welcome us with their melodies.

What is the ocean in distress telling us? How can we study its many facets to understand better its role in the global climate system, its ecosystems and the people drawing food, air to breath, recreation, jobs and more from it? The University Belgrano and Mundus maris joined forces for a day-long webinar on 6 November to explore at least some of these facets. It was orchestrated by Dr. Marcelo L. Morales Yokobori, researcher in ecology, conservation and marine resources.

We met Mónica Edwards Schachter years ago at an innovation meeting in Madrid, far from her native Argentina. Through sporadic contacts we kept in touch, each one deeply involved in their respective projects about ocean literacy and protection. The shared enthusiasm for mobilising the sciences and arts together for child and adult education in innovative ways made our roads cross again in the occasion of the launch of her beautiful children's book Guardians of the Sea,

25 September 2020. No more than 1.5°C increase max! - in some 480 towns and cities in Germany alone Fridays for Future had called to strikes and demonstrations to ask for immediate climate protection measures keeping in mind the necessary distancing between protesters and mandatory face masks - corona obliging. Mundus maris was at the manifestation in Düsseldorf in front of the Parliament building to underscore that climate protection and ocean protection go hand in hand.

Ocean Ambassadors is a dynamic non-profit in Nigeria promoting ocean literacy and interest in maritime professions with focus on young minds. They invited Mundus maris Vice President Prof. Stella Williams to join as speaker in a webinar on 25 July 2020 as a first step to develop mutually beneficial collaboration.

Event in Akure, Nigeria, kicks off while other on-site activities are postponed

The 2020 Mundus maris asbl World Ocean Day (MM WOD) in Akure, Nigeria, was celebrated on June 8. Due to the COVID-19 and the National lockdown, the celebration was a low-key event in the State. The event was marked with the Community Sanitation Service (CSS) of the MM Youngster Club; sensitisation on the use of face masks to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and Web participation for anybody from the Staff Secondary School, Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA) at home as a result of the National Lockdown.

June 8 is World Ocean Day and a good time to rethink how to put into practice what governments have promised on behalf of all of us when they adopted the Sustainable Development Goals, including stopping overfishing and implementing the Guidelines for Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries. Innovation for a sustainable ocean is the UN motto for this year, and the Corona pandemic certainly stimulates a lot of it.