The United States Census of Marine Life was established in 2002 in consultation with the National Academies of Sciences, the National Research Council, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the international Scientific Steering Committee (SSC) of the Census of Marine Life (CoML). The US component of the CoML, led by a National Committee (USNC), seeks to build broad US community support to establish CoML as a sustained national research and monitoring program for marine and coastal biodiversity in support of its mission.

The USNC works with Congress, federal agencies, the academic community, and private sector partners to establish a long-term, sustained program on marine biodiversity.

The goals are to:

• establish research and exploration programs that provide genetic-, species-, and community-level information;
• improve tools and technologies for studying the ocean and monitoring and projecting ecosystem change; and
• develop educational information to create an ocean literate society, influence ocean policy development, and foster wise use of US resources.

U.S. Program Home

The U.S. CoML Program Office is managed by the Consortium for Ocean Leadership.

The Consortium for Ocean Leadership is the unified voice for the ocean research and education community and serve as the prime point of contact between the ocean science community and the federal government. The new organization will continue to manage ocean research and education programs while advocating for sound marine policies and federal investment in ocean research and education.