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Undeniably, the ocean, due to its vastness will always remain a mystery. However, its potential is a certainty. Its resources are now viewed as central in our efforts to address the multitude of challenges that humanity is expected to face in the coming decades.

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For one, pundits projected that by 2050, “the world’s population shall be at least 9 billion.” With such size, the demands for food, jobs, energy, raw materials and economic growth will be enormous. Certainly, the massiveness of the ocean (both the surface as well as its resources down deep) has the potential to help meet these requirements. Collectively, these potentials and those that we've already enjoyed now is called the ocean economy.

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) defines ocean economy as the “the sum of the economic activities of ocean-based industries, together with the assets, goods and services of marine ecosystems.” This includes among others, “marine fishing and aquaculture, coastal and marine tourism, extractive industries (e.g. oil and gas, sea-bed mining), transport and logistics industries (freight and passenger transport), shipbuilding industries, renewable energy and marine biotechnologies.”