BBNJ SYMPOSIUM 2025

Nicola Ferri holds a PhD in International Law and currently serves as Senior Legal and Compliance Adviser at the GFCM. International lawyer with strong specialisation in ocean governance and over twenty years of professional experience in major global organisations and fora. His areas of expertise include blue economy (at international, regional and national levels), design and implementation of capacity-building projects and application of monitoring, control and surveillance technologies. Furthermore, he has deep familiarity with the BBNJ Agreement and the work of the GEF under the International Waters focal area. Dr Ferri has authored several peer-reviewed publications on various international law topics.

Professor David Freestone has been the Executive Secretary of the Sargasso Sea Commission since 2014. He is a former Visiting Professor and now a Visiting Scholar at The George Washington University Law School in Washington DC. He is the founding editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law (now in its 40th year). He is currently editing, with Joanna Mossop, a Commentary and Analysis of the 2023 BBNJ Agreement for Oxford University Press (forthcoming 2025). Recent work includes - Conserving Biodiversity in Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction (2019, Ed., Brill). In 2007 he was awarded the Elizabeth Haub Gold Medal for Environmental Law.

Nichola A. Clark is a senior officer at the Pew Charitable Trusts, where she lead’s Pew’s work related to the BBNJ treaty. She also leads the High Seas Alliance’s ABMT working group and is the policy co-lead of the IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas High Seas Specialist Group. Nichola has been actively engaged in the BBNJ treaty negotiations for the last decade, focusing particularly on the ABMT and institutional arrangements chapters of the text. Prior to joining Pew, she worked for the United States government on international fisheries issues and at the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies on deep-sea mining. Nichola received her Master’s degree from Duke University and is currently a PhD candidate at the University of Wollongong’s Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security (ANCORS).

Professor Joanna Mossop (Victoria University of Wellington) is an expert in the international law of the sea. Her publications cover a range of issues including maritime security, biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction, dispute settlement, ocean governance and the continental shelf. Professor Mossop has provided advice and training in law of the sea matters to the New Zealand government and the UN Development Agency. She was an independent legal adviser on the New Zealand delegation to the Intergovernmental Conference that negotiated the BBNJ Agreement. With Professor David Freestone she is currently co-editing a Commentary on the Agreement that will be published by Oxford University Press in early 2025.

Dr. Marie Antonette Juinio-Meñez is a Full Professor at the Marine Science Institute at the University of the Philippines, and an Academician of the National Academy of Science & Technology of the Philippines. She is recognised for her contributions in marine ecology, biodiversity conservation and policy.
Her research focuses on the biology and ecology of commercially important marine invertebrates and management of nearshore ecosystems. She is engaged in transdisciplinary development and training programs on community-based coastal resources management, sustainable mariculture, stock restoration and environmental governance.
She is the co-chair of the IUCN Species Survival Commission (SSC), Sea cucumber Specialist Group. She has over 90 peer- reviewed scientific publications, several book chapters, aside from conference proceedings and training manuals.

Lowri Mai Griffiths MBE is Head of the Ocean Policy Unit at the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. The Ocean Policy Unit leads UK policy on the implementation and interpretation of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, as well as other marine and maritime issues. Lowri was the Head of the UK delegation to the BBNJ Intergovernmental Conference and is a member of the UK delegation to the International Seabed Authority. She is also the FCDO representative on the UK National Decade Committee for the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development,
Prior to joining the Ocean Policy Unit, Lowri was a lawyer in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Legal Directorate, advising on issues relating to the UK’s Overseas Territories, including maritime boundary negotiations and marine management issues.

Thomas Vanagt is a marine biologist and entrepreneur. He obtained his PhD in marine ecology from the University of Ghent in Belgium. In 2009, he founded the marine environmental consulting company eCOAST, which he successfully sold to Eurofins in 2019. Since then, he has been building a new company, ABSint, which helps biotechnology companies transition from resource over lab to market. A key focus of ABSint is Access and Benefit-Sharing (ABS) on genetic resources. Thomas' interests in marine biology and genetic resources converge in the topic of Marine Genetic Resources, a central element of the BBNJ treaty. He has been an active participant in the BBNJ process since 2014.

Dr. Neo is a marine ecologist with more than 15 years of research experience in topics including marine biodiversity and conservation, population connectivity, wildlife trade of endangered marine species, and science communication. Her recent research focuses on building connections and networks with regional collaborators through shared challenges including marine plastics pollution and threatened marine species.

Mahesh Pradhan is the COBSEA Coordinator, an intergovernmental mechanism administered by the United Nations Environment Programme, which brings together nine countries (Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Singapore, Thailand, and Viet Nam) in protecting and conserving the marine environment in the East Asian Seas region. At COBSEA, he leads implementation of the Marine and Coastal Ecosystems Framework, which focuses on the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework under the overall theme of Sustainable Blue Economy. This Framework also considers Marine Spatial Planning, Marine Protected Areas, and Marine Habitats, such as seagrass, mangroves, and coral reefs, in the context of the East Asian Seas. Earlier, he was based at UNEP HQs in Nairobi where he coordinated the Global Partnership for Nutrient Management, providing technical backstopping for two resolutions of the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) on Sustainable Nitrogen Management.

Dr. Ina Tessnow-von Wysocki is an Ocean Nexus Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security (ANCORS), based at the University of Wollongong. Her research on international ocean governance in areas beyond national jurisdiction focuses on ocean equity with regards to multi-jurisdictional coherence of fisheries, deep-sea mining and marine biodiversity governance.
She holds a B.A. in Politics, International Relations and Asian Studies from Griffith University, Australia, a M.A. of International Relations from the joint program at Humboldt University Berlin, Freie University and University of Potsdam, Germany and a PhD in Political Science from the University of Vienna, Austria. Her professional experience includes climate and foreign policy with the German government, the GIZ, and NGOs in Europe, North America, Oceania and Latin America.

Laisa Branco de Almeida is a Ph.D. Candidate in international law at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies (IHEID). She holds a Master's Degree in International Law from the same institution, where she was granted the Hans Wilsdorf Fellowship from the Hans Wilsdorf Foundation. She is a qualified lawyer in Brazil and member of the Minerals and the BBNJ Groups of the Deep Stewardship Council Initiative and the World Commission on Environmental Law of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

As an early career researcher, my research has focussed on deep-sea ecology, the threats these communities face and the benefits of their conservation within the topics of deep-sea mining, climate change and oil and gas decommissioning. My methodology involves the use of marine imagery and physical sampling techniques from the West of Shetland, North Sea to the Clarion Clipperton Zone, Pacific. As part of the DeepEnd project, which attempts to show the value of deep-sea ecosystems, myself and partners at the Marine Biodiscovery Centre, Aberdeen, conducted a comprehensive investigation to catalogue and analyse the pharmaceutical potential of the deep sea with a view to aiding targeted biodiscovery in the deep, high seas.

J Murray Roberts is Professor of Applied Marine Biology & Ecology at the University of Edinburgh and founded the Changing Oceans research group. He chairs the Joint Working Group between St Abbs Marine Station and the University and led the EU Atlantic research programs ATLAS and iAtlantic. In 2022, he was appointed a Sargasso Sea Commissioner and a member of the Scottish Science Advisory Council. His research focuses on marine ecosystems and structural habitats like deep-sea cold-water corals. He has over 100 peer-reviewed publications, is the senior author of the textbook ‘Cold-water Corals,’ and a contributor to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Reports. His fieldwork spans the UK, Norway, Ireland, the U.S. Southeast, Cape Verde, and the Pitcairn Islands.
Before Edinburgh, Roberts was Professor and Director at Heriot-Watt University’s Centre for Marine Biodiversity & Biotechnology.