While deep sea mining is not currently undertaken in international waters, Ministers recognise the growing pressure to extract deep-sea resources and are concerned about the potential impacts of mining activities on the fragile marine environment. The Government has announced, therefore, that it supports a moratorium on the granting of exploitation licences for deep sea mining projects. I am assured that this is a precautionary approach.
This means the UK will not sponsor or support the issuing of any such licences until sufficient scientific evidence is available to assess the potential impacts of deep sea mining on marine ecosystems. To support this, the Government has also announced that the UK is committed to developing a new multi-disciplinary UK deep sea mining environmental expert network to champion UK expertise in environmental sciences. This network will help to fully understand the potential environmental impacts of deep sea mining and share these internationally. This will build on the independent evidence review on deep sea mining carried out by independent experts in 2022.
The UK has been pressing for strong enforceable environmental regulations, standards and guidelines to be developed by the International Seabed Authority (ISA). The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has been clear that these regulations should be in place before any mining is considered. The UK is committed to the multilateral system, which includes the ISA, and will work with partners at the ISA to ensure that the development of regulations and management of this potential new industry is fully informed in a careful, considered way, and is led by the science.
The UK is clear that it recognises that the impacts of deep sea mining are not fully understood and the Government supports research, using UK scientific expertise, to improve international understanding and enable effective regulation. The UK will continue its support for exploration under the ISA, which is critical in developing the environmental baseline and in supporting the science required to understand the potential environmental effects of deep sea mining.