Quick questions on Global governance of oceans - WJEC A-Level Geography

Because no state owns the high seas, individual users have an incentive to overexploit them, the classic tragedy of the commons described by Garrett Hardin. Oceans cover over $70$ per cent of the planet, provide food for billions, carry around $90$ per cent of world trade by volume, hold energy and minerals, and regulate the climate by absorbing heat and carbon dioxide, so their mismanagement has global consequences.

Overfishing has collapsed stocks (the Atlantic cod fishery off Newfoundland crashed in 1992 and has never fully recovered) and harmed coastal economies; plastic pollution accumulates in ocean gyres such as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, with millions of tonnes entering the sea each year; warming and acidification bleach coral reefs and stress fisheries; and rising demand for deep-sea minerals and ice-free Arctic shipping routes raises new geopolitical tensions.

Ocean governance is layered and multi-scalar. UNCLOS (the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, 1982) sets the framework, defining territorial waters (up to $12$ nautical miles), exclusive economic zones (up to $200$ nautical miles, where the coastal state controls resources) and leaving the high seas beyond as international. Regional fisheries management organisations set catch quotas, the International Maritime Organization regulates shipping and pollution (the MARPOL convention), marine protected areas conserve habitats, and the High Seas (BBNJ) treaty, agreed in 2023, for the first time allows protected areas beyond national jurisdiction.

Define the term global commons. [2 marks]

Explain one reason why governing the high seas is difficult. [3 marks]