621 
CONCLUSIONS 
Ns With respect to the gathering of factual 
information 
Full support should be given to the International 
Decade of Ocean Exploration, now being formulated, and to the 
continuance of the maximum international cooperation in the 
acquisition and exchange of information about the ocean floor. 
There should not be any embargo on or prohibition 
of exploration of deep sea mineral resources pending the 
negotiation of an international agreement relating thereto. 
To the contrary, all possible exploration, research, and 
exchange of knowledge should be encouraged. There is no need 
to prohibit this desirable progress because of uncertainties 
as to who shall control production, if minerals are discovered. 
2. With respect to the area within the exclusive 
jurisdiction of the coastal nations over 
submarine mineral resources 
Since exploration and exploitation of undersea 
minerals is likely to occur earlier in the shallower waters 
of the oceans adjacent to the continents than in the abyssal 
depths, it follows that if jurisdictional uncertainties arise 
to impede such operations during the next several decades, 
such problems will be primarily related to the scope of the 
mineral jurisdiction which is already vested exclusively in 
the coastal states by the “exploitability" and "adjacency" 
criteria of jurisdiction which now appear in the Continental 
Shelf Convention. This uncertainty, if necessity for its 
resolution occurs, might be removed by consultation among the 
major coastal nations which are capable of conducting deep sea 
mineral development, looking toward the issuance by those 
states of parallel ex parte declarations. These declarations 
might appropriately restrict claims of exclusive seabed 
mineral jurisdiction, pursuant to the exploitability and 
adjacency factors of the Continental Shelf Convention, to 
(i) the submerged portions of the continental land mass, or 
(ii) to a stated distance from the base line, whichever 
limitation encompasses the larger area. These declarations 
might appropriately recognize special cases. Two such classi- 
fications suggest themselves: (i) in the case of states whose 
