Census Organization

The Census of Marine Life is coordinated by a Secretariat based at the Consortium for Ocean Leadership in Washington, D.C. and governed by an international Scientific Steering Committee. Thirteen National and Regional Implementation Committees work under the guidance of the international Scientific Steering Committee and serve to strengthen the global reach of the Census in support of marine biodiversity research. A Synthesis Group has been established to organize, integrate, and synthesize the vast information gathered by the Census into common themes and overarching messages to ensure comprehensive content and products for 2010. Census-wide communications, media relations, education, outreach activities are coordinated by the Census Education and Outreach Team based at the University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography's Office of Marine Programs. The Mapping and Visualization Team based at Duke University's Marine Geospatial Ecology Lab is responsible for developing and sharing methods to display the results of the ten-year Census of Marine Life.

Seventeen projects conduct the research and analysis on six ocean realms that will be reported in the first Census of Marine Life in October 2010. The Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research Technology Panel monitors new technologies for observing marine life and recommends when cutting-edge marine technologies are mature enough to be used routinely in Census field projects.

Support for the Census of Marine Life comes from government agencies concerned with science, environment, and fisheries in a growing list of nations as well as from private foundations and corporations. The Census is associated or affiliated with several intergovernmental international organizations including the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of the UN, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN, the UN Environment Programme and its World Conservation Monitoring Centre, the Global Biodiversity Information Facility, the International Council for the Exploration of the Seas, the Group on Earth Observations and the North Pacific Marine Science Organization. It is also affiliated with international nongovernmental organizations including the Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research, Partnership for Observation of the Global Oceans and the International Association of Biological Oceanography of the International Council for Science.  The Census of Marine Life has established collaborative partnership with entities such as the Encyclopedia of Life and the National Geographic Society to broadly disseminate program results to broader audiences.

Read more about the work of the Census in the Reports and Perspectives sections.