Amsterdam, Netherlands – Greenpeace International launched a new report warning that the global target to protect at least 30% of the world’s oceans and other vital ecosystems by 2030 is on a path to failure, unless governments place human rights at the centre of marine conservation, today.

The report, “Global Ocean Justice Now: Making the Case for a Human Rights-Based Approach to Marine Conservation,“ is founded in long-standing collaboration with impacted communities. Ecosystems managed by Indigenous Peoples and local communities tend to be healthier, more biodiverse, and more resilient than surrounding areas with different governance. Yet, the report documents how communities are being pushed out, ignored, and actively harmed by state-sanctioned industrial developments and extractive industries. By consistently prioritising corporate profit and extractive industries, and by starving community-led conservation of critical support, governments are fundamentally failing to meet their international commitments.

Nichanan Tanthanawit, Global Project Lead, Greenpeace Ocean Justice Campaign said: “Too many governments are treating the 30×30 targets like a numbers game. You cannot claim to protect the ocean while excluding the very communities who have protected these ecosystems for generations. The science is already clear: oceans are healthier where communities have rights, power, and stewardship.” 

The report is being launched as world leaders begin the six-month countdown to the Convention on Biological Diversity’s COP17 in Yerevan, Armenia, where for the first time, countries will take stock of the stay of play of implementation of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. COP17 offers a critical window for course correction, where world leaders must accelerate efforts to recognise Indigenous Peoples and local communities’ rights on the ground as well as their key role in nature protection and management. At its core, the report exposes the rise of so-called “paper parks”: protected areas that exist on maps but offer little real-world protection, and non-inclusive conservation tools that are collecting dust on a shelf and are not implemented in practice.

This failure, the report shows, is structural. Governments consciously choose to routinely overlook the most time-tested form of ocean stewardship in human history: the knowledge, governance systems, and daily practices of Indigenous Peoples and local communities who have sustained coastal ecosystems for generations. Instead, by displacing those communities to make room for industrial projects described as “national development,” the ecological damage mounts and the biodiversity targets slip further out of reach.

Tanthanawit added: “Development cannot continue to be defined only through top-down policies,”  “Across the world, coastal communities are already showing the will and leadership to move development and conservation forward on their own terms. Without meaningful participation, 30×30 risks becoming just another number on paper.” 

From industrial salmon farming in Patagonia, to fishmeal factories in West Africa, to sand mining in Sri Lanka and mega-port developments in Southern Thailand, the report exposes this growing contradiction: governments are promising ocean protection internationally while enabling ecological destruction domestically. But communities are not victims –  Indigenous Peoples and local communities are the architects of some of the world’s most effective marine protection systems.

Mamadou Kaly Ba, Campaigner, Greenpeace Africa said: “Senegal’s coastal communities are facing an unprecedented crisis driven by industrial overfishing, fishmeal and fish oil production, pollution, and offshore oil and gas expansion, all of which threaten our marine ecosystems, food security, and traditional livelihoods. Yet across our coastline, communities are proving that sustainable and community-led marine conservation works when local people are empowered and included in decision-making. We urgently need stronger protection for small-scale fisheries, greater recognition of community rights, and a phase out of fishmeal and fish oil production if we are to secure a just and sustainable future for Senegal’s ocean and coastal communities.”

 Anita Perera, Campaigner, Greenpeace South Asia said: “From severe environmental degradation and external development pressures to a recent catastrophic shipping disaster that dumped over 1,600 tonnes of plastic into South Asian waters, the communities in Mannar have withstood a continuous ecological onslaught. Yet, through unyielding resistance, they fought their way to a landmark Presidential decree requiring local consent before any energy project can proceed. When frontline communities assert their right to self-determination, they don’t just protect biodiversity – they reshape legal frameworks.”

Greenpeace is calling on governments to urgently implement the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KM-GBF) and the 30×30 protection target. To do so, global efforts must prioritise redirecting conservation funding to community-led stewardship, halting destructive industrial activity in sensitive marine areas, and centering the rights and food security of Indigenous and coastal communities at every step.

ENDS

Notes to Editors:

Download the full report.

Executive summary of the report.

Photos available in the Greenpeace Media Library.

Contacts:

Greenpeace International Press Desk, +31 (0)20 718 2470 (available 24 hours), pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org

Making the case for a human rights-based approach to marine conservation

From Patagonia to the Gulf of Thailand, the communities who know the ocean best are rarely the ones deciding its future. That is not just a justice problem – it is also why global ocean protection is failing.

This report makes the case that the world’s ’30×30′ ocean protection targets cannot be met through top-down conservation models that sideline the very people who have sustained marine ecosystems for generations. Drawing on four in-depth case studies from Chile, Senegal, Sri Lanka, and Thailand, the report  documents both the cost of exclusion and the results of community-led stewardship while arguing  that rights-based conservation is not only the most just approach, but the most effective one. 

What the report covers:

• Why current conservation models produce ‘paper parks’ instead of protected oceans
• How Indigenous Peoples and local communities are already achieving stronger ecological outcomes
• What governments must do differently ahead of CBD COP17 in Yerevan, Armenia

Download the reports: 

Global Ocean Justice Now – Executive Summary

Global Ocean Justice Now – Full Report

Taipei, Taiwan — Today, Greenpeace East Asia activists confronted US semiconductor giant NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang in Taipei face-to-face, demanding that the AI chip monolith and its billionaire founder take responsibility for the soaring energy demands and carbon emissions across its supply chain, especially in the East Asian manufacturing hub of Taiwan, where most of its hardware is produced.

Activists intercepted Huang outside the Mandarin Oriental hotel in Taipei’s Songshan District ahead of his scheduled dinner with local technology executives and suppliers. They presented him with a 3D-printed, five-layer model cake that read: “AI Needs Renewable Energy”—a stunt turning Huang’s own recent industry remarks, where he called energy the foundational layer of AI development [1], into a direct demand for climate action. 

Confronted with the direct question, “Can you invest in renewable energy together with your suppliers in Taiwan?” Huang replied positively and signed the model cake. Greenpeace East Asia aims to hold him accountable for his words. 

Lena Chang, Climate and Energy Campaigner in Greenpeace East Asia’s Taipei office, said:

“With half of NVIDIA’s top 20 hardware suppliers operating in Taiwan, the island forms the bedrock of the company’s global supply chain. Yet, because the local grid relies heavily on fossil fuels, Taiwanese communities carry the unfair burden of severe grid strain and carbon pollution as a result of the AI frenzy.”

The action builds on a global wave of resistance against tech billionaires prioritizing rapid expansion over environmental limits. It follows an earlier protest by Greenpeace USA at NVIDIA’s GTC conference in San Jose in March, which targeted the company’s failure to address its growing carbon footprint with renewable energy.

Driven by soaring electricity consumption, NVIDIA’s supply chain emissions more than doubled between 2023 and 2025, dumping a massive environmental burden onto Taiwan [2], which manufactures over 90% of advanced chips globally [3]. NVIDIA’s primary manufacturer, TSMC, alone accounts for nearly 10% of Taiwan’s total electricity [4], forcing a dangerous expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure that threatens local public health and the energy transition [5]. Meanwhile, NVIDIA has lagged behind other global AI giants in decarbonization [6] and has yet to deploy its massive profits toward direct renewable energy investments in its East Asian manufacturing hubs [7].

Avex Li, Greenpeace East Asia Supply Chain Project Lead, said:

“Nvidia’s record-breaking earnings show once again that the AI frenzy is making extraordinary profits for a handful of powerful companies and billionaires. They cannot pretend they lack the power or resources to change course. It is time for them to take responsibility for building an AI future powered by renewable energy, not fossil fuels. ”

Greenpeace East Asia is demanding that NVIDIA act to:

1. Expand its 100% renewable energy target from its own corporate operations to cover its entire manufacturing supply chain by 2030.
2. Direct a substantial portion of NVIDIA’s capital profits into supplier-led renewable energy infrastructure across East Asian manufacturing hubs

ENDS

Notes:

Photos available in the Greenpeace Media Library.

[1] NVIDIA Blog, “AI is a 5-Layer Cake”

[2] Greenpeace East Asia Report, “NVIDIA’s Green Illusion”

[3] Industry market share data via the International Trade Administration, “Taiwan Semiconductors & AI”

[4] Based on metrics from the TSMC Sustainability Report and data from the Energy Administration, Ministry of Economic Affairs, link 1, link 2

[5] Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), “Public health impacts from electronics industry electricity consumption in Taiwan”

[6] Greenpeace East Asia Report, “Nvidia Ranks Last on AI Supply Chain Decarbonization, Greenpeace Report Finds”

[7] Based on Greenpeace East Asia’s monitoring of public corporate records, NVIDIA has made no public disclosure of any direct investments in renewable energy in East Asia to date.

Contacts:

Yujie Xue, International Communications Officer, Greenpeace East Asia, +852 5127 3416 (East/Southeast Asia timezone), yujie.xue@greenpeace.org  

Greenpeace International Press Desk, +31 (0) 20 718 2470 (Available 24 hours), pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org