As the Blue Economy expands, measuring economic value alone is insufficient; governments need a broader evidence base to assess sustainability, resilience and inclusion and guide better policy and investment
This is part of the essay series: Sagarmanthan Edit 2026.
The Blue Economy is increasingly recognised as a major source of growth, jobs and investment. Governments and businesses are looking to ocean-based activities — from fisheries and aquaculture to shipping, tourism, offshore energy and emerging areas such as blue carbon — as sources of economic opportunity. The scale of this opportunity is substantial. In India, where the coastline extends for more than 11,000 kilometres, the fisheries sector alone supports the livelihoods of nearly 30 million people. Globally, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) estimates that the global ocean economy generated around US$2.6 trillion in gross value added (GVA) and 133 million full-time equivalent jobs in 2020.
Yet this expansion also brings socio-economic and environmental risks. Intensifying economic activity can place greater pressure on marine and coastal ecosystems, exacerbate inequalities, and expose communities and businesses to greater climate risks. Nearly two-thirds of the ocean is already experiencing increasing cumulative human impacts, driven primarily by climate change and compounded by pressures such as overfishing and pollution. These pressures have consequences far beyond the environment: they threaten food security, livelihoods, and the sectors that rely on marine ecosystems. The challenge, therefore, is not simply to ensure that the Blue Economy grows, but to ensure that its growth is sustainable, inclusive and resilient.
This is why measurement is essential. As the Blue Economy grows in scale and complexity, governments need robust evidence to understand how it is evolving, assess whether progress is sustainable, and identify where policy and investment can make the greatest difference.
Measures of ocean economic activity provide a critical starting point. OECD estimates of ocean economy value added, for instance, can help answer fundamental questions: How large is the ocean economy? Which sectors are growing? How many jobs and how much value added are associated with ocean-based activities? These measures are indispensable for establishing the economic significance of the Blue Economy.
However, they are not sufficient to understand whether the Blue Economy is evolving sustainably.
A growing ocean economy may generate jobs, investment and revenues while increasing environmental pressures or creating new vulnerabilities. OECD work on Fiji's Blue Economy illustrates this challenge. Before COVID-19, tourism was one of the country's largest Blue Economy sectors, accounting for more than a third of employment. Yet when international tourism collapsed during the pandemic, Fiji's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) fell by 15.7 percent in 2020, the largest contraction in Fiji's modern history. Economic size alone therefore provides only a partial picture. It does not capture resilience and diversification, the health of natural capital, or the capacity to adapt. A meaningful assessment of the Blue Economy needs to capture the economic, social and environmental outcomes of ocean-based activities: not only how much value and employment they generate, but also who benefits, what pressures they place on marine and coastal ecosystems, and how resilient they are.
Measurement should also capture the enabling conditions that shape these outcomes. OECD work highlights the role of effective governance, data and analytical capacity, finance, diversification and resilience building, and regional and global co-operation for sustainable Blue Economy development. In many countries, fragmented governance, with responsibilities spread across ministries and entities without a clear mandate or shared vision, hinders the effective management of ocean resources and the trade-offs and synergies across the sectors depending on them. Data gaps can constrain evidence-based decision-making, while limited access to finance can prevent sustainable activities from reaching scale.
A meaningful assessment of the Blue Economy needs to capture the economic, social and environmental outcomes of ocean-based activities: not only how much value and employment they generate, but also who benefits, what pressures they place on marine and coastal ecosystems, and how resilient they are.
Tracking outcomes alongside key enabling conditions can therefore provide a more complete picture of progress, helping governments understand not only what is changing, but why—and what may be needed to accelerate or redirect that change.
Better measurement of the Blue Economy can help governments track performance, identify priorities and support more coherent decision-making.
First, it enables governments to track whether policies are delivering their intended economic, social and environmental outcomes. In doing so, it also strengthens accountability.
Second, measurement can reveal gaps and trade-offs that may otherwise remain hidden. Strong economic performance alongside deteriorating environmental outcomes, limited social benefits, weak institutional capacity or insufficient finance points to different policy challenges—and therefore requires different responses. Indonesia provides a useful illustration. OECD analysis found that Indonesia ranked 137th out of 221 countries in the 2020 Ocean Health Index, with low sustainability scores driven in part by unsustainable seafood harvesting and tourism. Economic statistics alone would not capture these changes in the natural assets on which future ocean-based activity depends, nor provide sufficient evidence to address the underlying challenges.
Third, better evidence can inform financing decisions. Understanding the scale, performance and investment needs of Blue Economy activities can help governments identify where finance is needed and which instruments may be most appropriate, including blue bonds, blended finance and other mechanisms for mobilising private capital.
Countries are developing their Blue Economies in different ways, reflecting differences in economic structures, natural resources, policy priorities and capacities. Some depend heavily on fisheries and tourism; others are developing shipping, offshore energy or new marine activities. The relative importance of the ocean economy also varies substantially. Within Southeast Asia, for example, OECD analysis shows that the ocean economy accounted for around 30 percent of GDP in Thailand and 28 percent in Indonesia, compared with 7 percent in the Philippines and Singapore in 2015.
Comparability can nevertheless provide a common language for policy dialogue and a shared evidence base. The purpose is not to rank countries or impose a single model of development, but to help identify shared challenges and solutions and enable countries to learn from one another.
This matters because many Blue Economy challenges are inherently regional or global. Fisheries, shipping, pollution and climate impacts do not stop at national borders. Common evidence can help countries identify common priorities, make policy dialogue more concrete, and enhance co-operation.
To help countries strengthen the evidence base for Blue Economy policy, the OECD is working with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to develop an OECD Blue Economy Index.
The Index offers an opportunity to develop a practical tool to track progress, support policy and investment decisions, strengthen accountability, and support peer learning and co-operation.
To help countries strengthen the evidence base for Blue Economy policy, the OECD is working with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to develop an OECD Blue Economy Index.
By combining quantitative and qualitative indicators, the Index can help countries benchmark progress over time and, where appropriate, against regional and global peers. It can also inform more targeted policy and investment decisions, while providing a common basis for dialogue among governments, stakeholders and development partners.
Its approach will reflect differences in national priorities, capacities and data availability. The objective is not to impose a one-size-fits-all model, but to develop a practical, credible and policy-relevant framework that countries can use and progressively strengthen.
The OECD is well placed to support this work, drawing on its integrated approach to the Blue Economy, including its holistic country diagnostics, and its multidisciplinary expertise across policy areas such as connectivity, shipping and blue finance.
The OECD also brings relevant experience in developing indicator-based frameworks and scoreboards to measure complex, multidimensional policy challenges. A recent example is the OECD Connectivity Scoreboard, developed to assess the performance of economic corridors. It brings together more than 40 indicators covering hard connectivity, soft connectivity, and performance and outcomes. It has recently been applied to the India-Middle East-Europe Corridor (IMEC).
Measuring the Blue Economy is not an end in itself. Nor should it reduce a complex process to a single number.
By providing a structured and comparable evidence base, the OECD Blue Economy Index can help governments understand where progress is being made, where gaps remain, and where policy and investment action may be needed. In doing so, it can support a Blue Economy in which economic opportunity and healthy ecosystems reinforce one another, resilience is embedded in development, and the benefits endure for generations to come.
Piera Tortora is Senior Advisor to the OECD on the Blue Economy, sustainable finance and Southeast Asia engagement.
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Andreas Schaal is the Director for OECD Global Relations and Co-operation, as well as the OECD Sherpa to the G7, the G20 and APEC.
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Piera Tortora is Senior Advisor to the OECD on blue economy, sustainable finance, and South East Asia engagement. Previously, Piera was the Head of the ...
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