“Remember that we are not the owners of this planet, but only its tenants, ownership belongs to the next generations“, underlined the Minister of Foreign Affairs Giorgos Gerapetritis during the press conference for the 9th International Conference on Oceans which will be hosted in Athens, on April 15-17, 2024, at the Cultural Center of the “Stavros Niarchos” Foundation.

As he pointed out, this is one of the great initiatives for the protection of the environment and especially the protection of the oceans and waters, “an issue that is a global high stake, but for our country it is also an existential issue».

“The focus of the adverse development, beyond the environmental crisis, is the Mediterranean, which is the hottest point on the planet with a significant increase in water level, but also a significant increase in temperature“, he said.

“We have no room for further concessions, we should seek the golden ratio between sustainable development, especially sustainable tourism development and environmental protection“, he pointed out and added: “It is our duty to transfer the environment to future generations at a very high level of adequacy and sustainability»

The conference, as he recalled, began in 2014, at the initiative of former US Secretary of State John Kerry, and has been hosted in all parts of the world

“The high stakes are to protect the environment and the waters, mainly to bequeath to future generations their fair share of the environmental legacy“, write down.

He pointed out that the event will be attended by governments, NGOs, Civil Society and agencies, all those who have a high level of awareness about the environment.

The goal, as he emphasized, is “to produce tangible results, to take tangible actions that will improve the level of environmental protection”.

After all, in the context of international conferences there have been very specific and tangible commitments from states, which concern not only resources that must be invested in environmental protection, but also commitments that have to do with regulatory issues concerning environmental law and international environmental protection.

In previous years, he pointed out, we had 2,161 commitments from states and international organizations, while the financial footprint exceeds 130 billion dollars.

“They constitute a universal international initiative for the protection of the environment. It does not concern a single state, it does not even concern a group of states, even if they are in environmentally degraded or sensitive areas, but the entire planet».

Traditionally, as he mentioned, the international conference moves along six axes: climate change, sustainable fisheries, blue economy, marine protected areas, maritime safety and marine pollution.

To these, Greece has added four axes of special interest: sustainable tourism, tackling plastic and microplastic pollution, green shipping and the green transition in the Mediterranean.

These, the foreign minister said, are important priorities for Greek foreign policy, for public diplomacy. “We all understand what it means to have a global alliance, which will check that the tourism product is not exercised at the expense of environmental protection,” he said.

He also emphasized that the participations are very high, with 120 member state delegations, specifically 113 states and 7 international organizations. Among them we have 12 heads of state and government, especially from America, Oceania and the Far East and 50 ministers and under-ministers of foreign affairs, as well as ministers of the environment and ministers with responsibility for water and oceans

He said that all the Mediterranean states have been invited and all will be represented, while there will also be high-level representatives at the level of organizations, such as the president of the European Council Charles Michel, the Commissioner for the Environment, Oceans and Fisheries Virginios Sinkevitsous, and also the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew .