Regional Marine Turtle Agreements and Marine Management Frameworks

For example, regional marine turtle conservation agreements now cover many areas of the globe, including the Americas, the West coast of Africa, the Indian Ocean and South East Asia. The Indian Ocean and South East Asia Memorandum of Understanding on Marine Turtle Conservation and their Habitats (IOSEA) is a voluntary agreement between range state countries within the region, to protect and manage their turtle populations.

This coordinated management across migratory pathways is critical to providing adequate protection to turtles, and the communities that depend upon them, throughout their life-cycles.

Together with other agreements and conventions such as the Partnership for Ecosystem Management of East Asian Seas (PEMSEA), and the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), IOSEA encourages and supports cooperative broader marine management at the regional scale among all parties to the agreement.

Working to protect, conserve, replenish & recover marine turtles and their habitats
WWF is a key partner to many of the governments in the range state countries, and will continue to work with these governments, local communities, and regional environmental agreements, to encourage full participation and effective implementation of the agreements.

WWF will also promote the adoption of the most appropriate form of regional marine turtle agreement to cover the South Pacific region, a part of the ocean which currently has no regional marine turtle conservation arrangement.

WWF will continue to advocate and demonstrate the links between marine turtle conservation, sustainable development of coastal communities and the broader marine management agenda in relevant international conventions and agreements.