Could deep-sea mining sustain sustainability? The international seabed authority and the UN 2030 agenda

Madureira et al. (2023)published a timely article about the role of deep-sea mining in sustainable development – UN Agenda 2030. We take the opportunity to join the discussion initiated by the authors and highlight the known challenges in deep-sea mining discussions using rich, empirical social and natural science literature. Our premise is the following: sustainable development depends on careful assessment of pressing, known issues that need attention. Local problems require context-specific, local solutions to make propositions about the future and sustainability unambiguous and workable. Meaningful discussions on sustainability in relation to ocean and terrestrial mining depend on engagement with a broad body of literature, from anthropology to human geography, policy and governance research, among others. In sum, we hope to contribute to a more comprehensive interdisciplinary discussion on the contested topic of deep-sea mining and its role in sustainability. • Deep-sea mining has no clear and tangible connection to the UN Sustainable Development Goals. • Deep-sea mining discussions depend on diverse social and natural science literature that is often unintentionally ignored. • Genuine interest in finding solutions for negative terrestrial mining impacts should be based on knowledge of local context. • Attention is needed for pressing issues in mining such as manipulative social engineering and problematic epistemologies. • Benefit sharing discussions should include ideas that benefit the global society and not contractors.