IMDOS – the Integrated Marine Debris Observing System, a key initiative supported by GEO Blue Planet and the Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS), held its first Steering Committee* meeting in January 2025. Bringing together the new Steering Committee* members for the first time, this meeting explored global cooperation and action plans for the year.
With negotiations for a global treaty on plastic pollution ongoing, the need for science-driven solutions has never been greater. IMDOS seeks to support a community-wide coordinated effort to fill the knowledge gap with an international, sustainable marine debris monitoring system and address diverse stakeholder needs with adequate data and information. By encouraging the establishment of standardised methods and the harmonization of data from multiple sources, IMDOS will ensure that reliable, evidence-based information is made available by the scientific community and easily accessible to support decision-making and benefit research and the private sector.
Cooperation is at the core of the IMDOS initiative. Alongside GEO Blue Planet and GOOS, United Nations Environment Programme’s (UNEP) Global Partnership on Plastic Pollution and Marine Litter (GPML), is supporting its development. The European Union, through the EU4OceanObs project, is providing funding support.
It is perhaps natural, then, that the Steering Committee* focused the first part of their meeting on examples of successful international cooperation that could help guide future IMDOS efforts.
First, Natalie Harms and Nao Takeuchi (UNEP) presented the GPML initiative, and in particular, the GPML Digital Platform - a global open-source, crowd-sourced, multi-stakeholder platform that aims to be the single access point for all data on plastic pollution. Georg Hanke (EU Joint Research Center) followed with a presentation on the development of the seafloor litter community, first at the European level, then later expanded to include China, Japan, and the USA. Finally, Atsuhiko Isobe (Kyushu University) explained how microplastic abundance data goes through a quality control process before being included in AOMI – a global database for microplastic abundance operated by the Ministry of Environment in Japan. The quality control helps ensure that the data can be synthesised and compared globally.
Discussions after the presentations sought to identify some of the ingredients for successful cooperation globally, the challenges IMDOS will likely encounter, and potential solutions.
The IMDOS Steering Committee* is formed by two sub-committees. The Advisory sub-Committee* provides high-level strategic guidance and connections and, where possible, contributes resources. The Work Programme sub-Committee* is made up of Task Team chairs, each responsible for coordinating specific thematic activities.
Alongside identifying ongoing and/or already funded activities, the Steering Committee* discussed ideas for the Task Teams Action Plans for the first-, 2nd-to-5th years and 5+ years, but focused especially on prioritizing actions for year one. More generally, the need for sustained funding was highlighted to ensure the long-term viability of IMDOS and to support opportunities to raise the profile of IMDOS and the marine debris issue. A scan of possible financial sources was done.
*The group also discussed the role of IMDOS committees and associated names which may be updated in the near future.
The next steps include participation at the Global Partnership on Plastic Pollution and Marine Litter (GPML) Community of Practice (CoP) Workshop in March 2025. IMDOS, with its partners, is working on a Declaration on global monitoring to be adopted at the upcoming UN Ocean Conference (UNOC3) in Nice, France. IMDOS will also be presented in the Digital Ocean Pavillion in the UNOC3 Green Zone. At the One Ocean Science Congress, which falls just before UNOC3, GEO Blue Planet will give a presentation to showcase IMDOS activities and foster global coordination and cooperation.
The report for this meeting is being prepared and will be shared here as soon as possible.
An article about INC-5 – the latest negotiations for a global plastics treaty: https://www.eu4oceanobs.eu/moving-forward-with-a-global-plastics-treaty/
An article about the IMDOS initiative: https://imdos.org/news/building-a-global-observing-system-for-marine-debris-the-imdos-initiative
The IMDOS website: https://imdos.org
The Global Partnership on Plastic Pollution and Marine Litter Digital Platform: https://digital.gpmarinelitter.org
An article about UNOC3 and the One Ocean Science Congress: https://www.eu4oceanobs.eu/a-nice-summer-of-ocean-science-sustainability-and-solutions/