Sent 12 September 2018. Part of Little Blue Letter.

"We are all in the same canoe and have to paddle together."
~ Olai Uludong (on negotiating a high seas treaty)
High time for the high seas
As summer draws to a close, the international community gathered in the windowless halls of UN headquarters in New York to take an historic step on Long and Winding Road towards a new agreement that could protect the dumbo octopus, the recently discovered pink, blue and purple translucent snail fish, and all the other wonders waiting beyond national waters. You can catch up on the action with the Earth Negotiations Bulletin and dive into the details with the High Seas Alliance Treaty Tracker. 
President Rena Lee (Singapore) opens the first session of the intergovernmental conference (IGC)
Source: IISD
A 1977 perspective on sea-bed mining
Forty years ago, a writer for the New York Times said that seabed mining was, "one of the most bitterest - and, some observers say, most hopeless disputes in international relations." The Law of the Sea Convention (1982) was still half a decade away, and mining companies, eager to get to work, complained that "progress at the UN is slower than the growth of manganese nodules. Politics aside, extraction itself seemed rather daunting: "One mining expert compares his company's process to picking something off the sidewalk by dangling a long piece of spaghetti from the top of the World Trade Center."
The modern equivalent of the dangling spaghetti. The proposed use of these monstrosities to mine the seafloor understandably has many worried that there will be irrevocable damage to delicate benthic ecosystems.
Adventurers
In 1947, Thor Heyerdahl floated for 101 days in the Kon-Tiki raft, drifting from Peru and across the Pacific towards Polynesia in a quest to show that South Americans could have settled the islands. The documentary Kon-Tiki, which won an Oscar in 1951, shows the crew of six catching flying fish and diving in a bamboo cage with the sharks (and not a single piece of plastic in sight). 
Gif of the week
Hopefully the high seas treaty negotiations will be at least as fast as a swimming sloth.
From the editor
The International Whaling Commission (IWC) is meeting in Brazil, as scientists in the Pacific Northwest of the United States ponder whether whales are grieving their dead. A once-captive dolphin taught its friends to tail walk. Despite the dramatic decline in fisheries worldwide, one in every three fish caught never makes it on to a plate. The International Oceanographic Commission is holding a meeting this week to plan the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030). Thanks so much to all the dedicated folks that are pushing for a strong agreement for the conservation and sustainable use of the high seas - you are my heroes! And special thanks to Isabel, our phenomenal intern who sadly leaves us next week - the IDDRI ocean team will miss you!
Little Blue Letter was curated this week by Isabel Seeger. Isabel is a Masters student in Environmental Policy at Sciences Po (Paris) and is currently interning at IDDRI. She is now ready to settle into a life among high seas researchers and conservationists.
Editing etc. by Glen Wright. Glen is a researcher studying marine governance, the high seas, and ocean energy. He is a drinker of tea, lover of the sea, and an Oxford comma user. Glen recently published Academia Obscura: The Hidden Silly Side of Higher Education.
 

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