Swan Hellenic outlined its actions for ocean health at the event hosted by the European Commission and Genoa City Council in Genoa, Italy, on June 26.

The event launched the program titled “The Shared Transition Plan of Mayors: A Best Practice for the Mission Restore our Ocean & Waters by 2030,” featured contributions from EU parliamentarians, Italian government ministers and mayors from across Italy and Spain.

Swan Hellenic CEO, Andrea Zito, outlined Swan Hellenic’s concrete actions for ocean health as an example of how the shipping sector can help the mission to save oceans and waters.

“We’ve partnered with numerous Citizen Science initiatives, enabling our onboard experts and guests to contribute valuable conservation data. This ranges from reporting cloud data with NASA and recording whale sightings with Happywhale, to monitoring phytoplankton with the Secchi Disk Study and Antarctic seabird numbers with Stony Brook University,” said Zito.

“Now we’ve taken another important step that is the core of our commitment to Mission Ocean and Waters, offering our ships as data collection and research platforms in remote seas, initially through our partnership with the Fundacion Philippe Cousteau and Sustainable Development Goals for the Mediterranean. The first initiative will be measuring and monitoring microplastic and heavy metal distributions, with more to come.”

A draft of the Declaration of Ocean Rights will be presented to the United Nations General Assembly in September 2023.