Awni Behnam

Tracing the Blue Economy Awni Behnam

Forming part of the Fondation de Malte's LUMEN Monograph Series, in this text Dr. Awni Behnam, President of the International Ocean Institute and former Assistant Secretary-General of the United Nations, explores how we must live "with the ocean and from the ocean in a sustainable relationship". The interconnectedness of emerging global challenges is forcing a policy dimension change in the form of the Blue Economy as an integrated approach to the governance of the ocean and urban interface, revolving around the human dimension. The paradigm shift came when Elisabeth Mann Borgese - founder of the International Ocean Institute - viewed the situation from the seaward side, where a sustainable ocean economy integrates with and is inclusive of the Green Economy. She famously stated "if before you saw the sea and the sea floor as a continuation of the land, you now see the land as a continuation of the sea,"; the concept of the Blue Economy is an attempt to do justice to that genius vision.