Sustainable Ocean Economy: Charting a Prosperous Blue Future from Risk to Resilience

The ocean lies at the center of several key issues that businesses and finance actors will be expected to address in the coming years—climate change, nature loss, and pollution—with expected greater integration of the marine environment as broader sustainability regulations, policies, frameworks, and initiatives develop and mature. There is a real opportunity now for businesses and financial institutions to upskill, get ahead of the curve on ocean issues and synergies, and not wait to be swept up by the incoming waves of regulation and policies.

To help make the case for mainstreaming ocean sustainability, and add to the existing literature, Citigroup carried out an original analysis consisting of two parts: (1) an assessment of impact materiality and revenue exposure for industries and (2) a geospatial analysis to identify potential hotspots of marine natural capital loss.

John Virdin, director of the Ocean and Coastal Policy Program at the Nicholas Institute for Energy, Environment & Sustainability, was one of the expert contributors to this report.