Ocean Wide Apart, Intimate In Heart

ASEAN has sea area of around 5,060,100 km2. With that area ASEAN has great
potential in the sea. Indonesia as one of the founders of ASEAN has a coastal length of
95,181 km2, with an area of 5.8 million km2.
Tourism had been a challenge in ASEAN, particularly Indonesian. With tropical sea
areas, indonesia and other ASEAN countries have underwater ecosystem that attract tourism.
Trend of damage coral in Indonesia today has a significant increase. Data from the
Indonesian science institute LIPI in 2017 shows that only 6.39% of coral in good condition.
Garbage is the most destructive thing to ecosystem. Like when the plastic trash in
the sea can block the sunlight that is needed by coral reefs. The pollution by various wastes
can damage the survival of coral reefs. Industrial wastes that aren’t processed and are
immediately thrown away to sea very damaging to the aquatic ecosystem. This waste
includes industrial, agricultural, household waste.
The Sustainable Development Goals planned by PBB is a program who has 17 aim,
one of them is protecting life under the sea which is one of the global problems. This can be a
cooperation between ASEAN and Australia in protecting underwater life on intercontinental,
like we know that one of the seas of ASEAN countries is also bordered by Australia.
Moreover, the geographic conditions between the two continents have a good
potential, like they has a widest part of the sea in their continnets and a lot of potential that
can be developed. But the problem is that underwater life conditions are increasingly
threatened because of garbage and waste that pollutes the sea. This is the point of our
discussion.
The geographical condition of ASEAN who has a wider ocean than land and many
areas that haven’t been explored and of course this is a very real potential. Even more,
Indonesia is a maritime country, it can be a way to cooperation between ASEAN and
Australia in developing this potential for the public welfare. Like in the field of underwater
nature conservation and also in the field of tourism which we know that ASEAN has a
tourism location whose beauty has been recognized by the world. This can be way to inter-
continental cooperation and can improve the economic conditions of the local comunities
As agents of change, the role of youth is needed to contribute in the solving problems
about the sustainability of ecosystems and marine biota. now the existence the role of youth is
not really much, even today youth are increasingly apathetic towards the sustainability of
marine ecosystems because the growth of technology. From this problem, youth must be
actively campaigning for public awareness about the sustainability of marine ecosystems,
building communities that active in fighting the destruction of marine ecosystems, and
building multilateral cooperation that actively monitors, safeguards and improves marine
ecosystems . With that plan, it is expected to be able realize the sustainability of marine
ecosystems in Indonesia and ASEAN.