Ocean Equity

Marine affairs professor and social anthropologist Yoshitaka Ota says the ocean is not a zero-sum game. The world’s oceans can provide for all—if we use them wisely and fairly.

Yoshitaka Ota was trying to figure out what to do with the rest of his life when, on a whim, he decided to go kayaking and do some spearfishing. An eager Ph.D. student in social anthropology, Ota had traveled across the world to study the religious cults of Palau. His fieldwork there didn’t materialize, and he sought solace in the sea around this Micronesian archipelago.

There, on the waves, he did find solace, as well as, eventually, direction and purpose. He didn’t catch any fish that day, but he did decide to marry his interest in human societies to the study of marine ecosystems.

“It’s very rare to have an anthropologist working on the water,” he laughs in his office at the Coastal Institute in Kingston, R.I. “But when I started my Ph.D., my professors told me to find the thing only I can do.”

A pioneer throughout his professional life, Ota, originally from Japan, is devoted to sustaining and protecting the oceans so they can continue to provide for those who rely on them. He founded Ocean Nexus with the Nippon Foundation in 2019, curating a global network of researchers dedicated to transforming ocean governance through equity and justice advocacy and to dismantling systemic structures rooted in racism, colonialism, and gender discrimination.

One of their areas of focus is marine protected areas (MPAs). These are areas in which human activity is restricted to protect and sustain marine resources and ecosystems. Nearly 200 countries have signed on to a global agreement to designate 30% of the world’s oceans as MPAs by 2030. The agreement, in practice, will place a disproportionate conservation bur-den on the Global South, where fishing grounds have been taken in the service of conservation, he says. Ota and Ocean Nexus are working to revise this global agreement to prioritize food sovereignty and the livelihoods of coastal communities and to consider protection of local rights and access.

“With Ocean Nexus, I am making the point by supporting fishing communities,” Ota explains. “We are looking at ocean policy and asking questions like: What are the resources available under the impacts of climate change, and will these resources be available in the future? Does it make sense for governments to support development policy in the context of climate change, and who benefits from such policy?”

Another focus for Ocean Nexus teams is pollution. They are looking at who is affected and which parts of the global cycles of food production, manufacturing, and transportation have the greatest impact. For example, they created a Marine Debris Action Plan for the state of Washington and are expanding knowledge about waste colonialism—the practice of industrialized nations sending hazardous materials and waste to poorer countries under the guise of recycling.

“Some benefit while others pay the con-sequences,” Ota says. “That’s how I connect social science and the ocean, and that will help us engage with the complexity of the ocean and the potential simplicity of the solutions.”

As a teacher, Ota engages students in ocean equity topics in novel ways, says Ocean Nexus co-director and URI marine affairs adjunct professor Cinda Scott.

“You don’t see ocean equity offered formally anywhere else,” Scott says, adding that the connection between equity and ocean communities is usually never made in academic settings. “It’s fascinating watching the Ph.D. and master’s students—when it clicks, and they realize oppression in ocean settings isn’t just a one-off situation where something happened to a particular group of people, but they see that, in fact, it’s happening repeatedly all over the world.”

Ota manages more than 200 global research projects. Ota’s and Scott’s students are researching topics like displacement of fishing villages in Honduras, equitable global frameworks for marine carbon dioxide removal in the Pacific Islands, climate adaptation and African feminism in Ghana, and caste and small-scale fisheries policy in Southern India.

“Our research assumes that we do not start from the same line,” says Ota. “We don’t all have the same resources, capacity, and history. We tend to think that if we provide more to others, then we will lose our share. This is not true, especially for the ocean, which has enough to serve all and is not a zero-sum game. Ocean equity corrects the power imbalances that are embedded in ocean governance, policy, and economy to return power to communities.”

“I really hope, maybe in five years, this becomes much more mainstream to speak about—to pursue social justice and equity as the only way to ensure a sustainable future in the ocean. Otherwise, you won’t have a future,” Ota adds. “And it’s my job to make it.”

—Annie Sherman

Photo: Ayla Fox