Applications for the Our Ocean Youth Leadership Summit. The Our Ocean conferences were initiated by Secretary of State John Kerry in 2014. Further, with the aim to put oceans on the foreign policy agenda and create a platform where leaders from government, business, and civil society meet on an equal footing to promote action and innovation for clean, healthy and productive oceans. The intended theme for the “Our Ocean Youth Leadership Summit” is “Co-creating the Sustainable Blue Economy”.

Following Norway’s global leadership in integrated ocean management.  The summits programming will intend to inspire, inform, and empower participants to build holistic solutions. Additionally,  that better balance the needs of society, industry and the ocean environment. The Oslo conference will highlight the importance of knowledge as the basis of the actions. Also, policies to ensure sustainable future economic growth. It will emphasize integrated management of sea and coastal areas as the key to protection and sustainable use of the oceans.

Across the board, program content will encourage youth to take a scientific approach to marine challenges. Further,  in alignment with the UN Ocean Decade for Science. Specifically, panels will focus on the importance of leveraging data borne from science and technology.  To create informed ocean decisions and policy solutions that maximize output while minimizing harm.

The conference will build partnerships between government, industry, science and civil society, putting knowledge, technology, and finance into action to meet the challenges facing the ocean and enable production and protection to go hand in hand so that the ocean can continue to provide for the needs of future generations.

Benefits

• Participants will leave the summit with an enriched understanding of the systemic challenges of ocean health. Also,  how they can bridge the needs of multiple stakeholders across government, the private sector and academia to spur ocean action and be agents of positive change.
• Sustainable Ocean Alliance (SOA) aims at covering, for each participant, 3-night accommodation in a shared twin room from October 22 to October 25, 2019.
• If the selected candidate requires a visa to travel to Norway, a visa letter will be provided.
• Coffee breaks with drinks and light snacks and lunches are during the length of the conference.
• A buffet lunch will be on October 23 and 24, 2019.
• Non-alcoholic drinks and finger foods will be served during the cocktail reception on October 22, 2019 (location TBC).

Eligibilities

• Problem-solver, sustainability champion, students, young professional below 35 years old
• Have an interest in sustainability and contributing to solving our planet’s greatest challenges: ocean acidification, marine pollution, habitat destruction, and overfishing to name a few.
• It is not mandatory to already be an ocean advocate and educated on ocean challenges. A series of online boot camps (webinars) will be in the lead up to the summit to build a foundation for the bootcamp.