By the end of 2026, the European Union will decide what its ocean protection commitments are actually worth.

The European Union is preparing a new law, the Ocean Act, due to be proposed by the end of 2026. Several EU Mediterranean states have already declared large shares of their waters protected, but in the water, enforcement has often lagged far behind the map. Whether the Ocean Act closes that gap, or lets it become permanent, is still being decided.

This is the stage for a conference co-organized by IndyACT at the European Parliament this Ocean Week: “Protection that Pays: The Socio-Economic Case for MPAs and an Ambitious EU Ocean Act,” in collaboration with Blue Marine Foundation, WWF Europe, ClientEarth, Seas At Risk, and the Med Sea Alliance. Over two panels, NGO representatives, scientists, fishing communities, and policymakers will discuss how well-enforced MPAs pay for themselves, in fish stocks, coastal livelihoods, and long-term resilience.

If you work on marine conservation anywhere else in the Mediterranean, that decision is not background noise. It concerns you directly. What matters for us is the standard it sets, and standards, unlike legislation, do not stop at a border. Standards move fast in our region, because the Mediterranean is one interconnected sea. Currents, fish stocks, and migratory species move without regard for exclusive economic zones, and in practice, so do policy ideas. When EU countries adopt stronger no-take rules, real bycatch limits, or enforcement budgets that actually protect their MPAs, those tools reach the other shores of the sea. NGOs across North Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean cite them as proof of what is possible and use them to press their own governments toward equivalent commitments. We have seen this dynamic on numerous occasions around the basin. An ambitious EU Ocean Act, one with real enforcement teeth rather than another set of voluntary targets, raises that reference point for everyone.