The projected impacts of climate change and greenhouse gas emissions pose a significant threat to marine life and biodiversity. Ocean warming might affect fish stocks, their health and migratory routes. Ocean acidification and de-oxygenation are two phenomena that affect certain marine species as well as entire marine ecosystems. Rebuilding of overexploited and depleted fisheries and managing fisheries sustainably will require comprehensive governance structures for port, flag, coastal and market States, which also need to address the causes and impacts of climate change. Addressing both concerns under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) could open opportunities for comprehensive and synergetic regulation. This Chapter addresses potential synergies between oceans and climate governance. Suggestions to this end include (i) increasing ocean-based renewable energy, (ii) decarbonizing ocean-based transport, (iii) pursuing integrated management of fisheries and aquaculture, and (iv) enhancing CO2 uptake in ocean ecosystems.

This chapter introduces the concept of networking of carbon markets and analyses the political, legal and practical reasons for using networking as opposed to linking. It also considers how the application of DLT can help to operationalise a networked carbon markets framework.

Climate change causes changes in forests, their ecological functions and ecosystem services. Many of these changes will negatively impact people, plants, animals and micro-organisms that depend on forests. SDG 13 aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change and drive adaptation actions. Current commitments are insufficient to reach the Paris Agreement goals of restricting warming to less than 2oC and increasing resilience of vulnerable communities. Better forest and land management can contribute up to 20 per cent of the Paris goals, while increasing community and ecosystem resilience, and help bridge this gap. Strong synergies between SDG 13 and forests can drive investment in sustainable forest management, forest restoration and forest conservation. However, achieving these synergies is challenged by unsustainable forest exploitation and pressures to develop land for agriculture, urban areas and infrastructure. Maximising potential synergies between forests and SDG 13 requires long-term finance and local collaboration, but currently only 3 per cent of climate finance is dedicated to forest actions, and much less is used for local implementation. Improved forest management and conservation can be achieved through more efficient use of the finance, increased investment from public and private sectors and stronger commitment to local actions.

Chapter 4 – Global arenas of transformation – analyses how the transformation concept has been used to describe or advocate change towards sustainable development in international contexts. The chapter presents the development of the research field and provides an overview of how sustainability transformations have been approached in the news media in different parts of the world. Media texts also present a range of transformation goals that are of two types: those intended to prevent the risks of environmental degradation and human insecurity, and those that propose ideas on how to attain various sustainable futures. Finally, the chapter explores how sustainability transformations have been conceptualized in international politics, with particular focus on the variations in policy discourse in low–, middle–, and high-income countries, in Agenda 2030 and the Voluntary National Reviews of the Sustainable Development Goals as well as the Nationally Determined Contributions to the Paris Agreement.