II. Background 



The International Decade of Ocean Exploration was conceived as a 

 response to the realization that nations would increasingly need to turn 

 to the sea to meet the growing world demand for food, minerals and 

 energy. This realization was accompanied by questions about the extent 

 and distribution of marine resources, their ownership, and the nature and 

 extent of national jurisdiction over the seas, notably in discussions on law 

 of the sea in the United Nations. It was the position of the United States 

 that not enough was known about the nature, location and extent of 

 oceanic resources, the uses to which they could be put, and the technology 

 that would be requifed to exploit them. To acquire the necessary scientific 

 background quickly and efficiently, the United States proposed the IDOE 

 to the U.N. General Assembly in 1968.^ 



The IDOE concept was endorsed by the Intergovernmental Ocean- 

 ographic Commission (IOC), an agency of UNESCO, in 1969, and by 

 the General Assembly later that year. Member nations were called upon 

 to formulate proposals for national and international programs, and to 

 make preparations to embark on them as soon as possible so that the 

 Decade might get underway in 1970. Numerous planning studies were 

 undertaken, notably those under the auspices' of the IOC by its Group 

 of Experts on Long-Term Scientific Policy and Planning (GELTSPAP)- 

 and by the Joint Working Party on the Scientific Aspects of International 

 Ocean Research which produced the 'Tonza Report" entitled "Global 

 Ocean Research" ' and in the U.S., the study conducted jointly by the 



1 An account of the origins of the IDOE may be found in 'The Politics of the 

 Ocean" by E. Wenk, University of Washington Press, 1972. See also "Fisheries and 

 the IDOE" by J. L. McHugh, Proceedings of the Gulf and Caribbean Fisheries 

 Institute, 23rd Annual Session, November 1970, for an account of the goals and 

 aspirations of the IDOE by the first head of NSF's IDOE Office. 



" Report of the Group of Experts on Long-Term Scientific Policy and Planning, 

 GELTSPAP/I/17, UNESCO/IOC, December 23, 1970. 



^ "Global Ocean Research," a report by the Joint Working Party on the Scientific 

 Aspects of Ocean Research, in "Comprehensive Outline of the Scope of the Long- 

 term and Expanded Program of Oceanic Exploration and Research," UNESCO/ 

 IOC Technical series, no. 7, 1970. 



