Prada Group and UNESCO launch a fund for Ocean preservation

The SEA BEYOND – Multi-Partner Trust Fund for Connecting People and
Ocean has been unveiled during the 2025 United Nations Ocean Conference

Milan, Nice, Paris, 9 June 2025 – At the 2025 United Nations Ocean Conference, in Nice, Prada Group and UNESCO announced today the launch of the SEA BEYOND – Multi-Partner Trust Fund for Connecting People and Ocean. Starting with a contribution of €2 million by PRADA, the SEA BEYOND Multi-Partner Trust Fund will mobilize financial resources from a variety of partners to restore the relationship between humankind and the ocean – in line with one of the objectives of the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development, coordinated by UNESCO¹.

The agreement was signed at the UNESCO pavilion – “Beyond Borders: Ocean Futures” – hosted at La Baleine, Nice's Palexpo, by Ms. Audrey Azoulay, UNESCO Director-General and Mr. Lorenzo Bertelli, Head of Corporate Social Responsibility of the Prada Group and Executive Director, Patron of the Ocean Decade Alliance.

The Fund will be the first of its kind to support projects that integrate ocean science, culture, and education in a synergistic and coherent manner, backing initiatives in five priority areas:

Blue Education: to empower students with the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, by including ocean literacy in school curricula;
Youth Empowerment and Engagement: to provide opportunities for youth and earlycareer professionals to improve their knowledge and skills and contribute effectively toocean discussions at multiple scales;
Ocean Culture and Heritage: to improve recognition of the critical role of culturalconnections between humankind and the ocean in tackling global challenges andpromoting sustainable development;
Science-Policy-Society Interface: to promote adequate representation of societal needsin policy-making processes;
Strategic Communication and Narrative Shifting: to build skills for developing anddelivering targeted messages or actions focused on challenges faced by the ocean,sustainable responses and actionable solutions.

The Fund will be supported by a Scientific Committee, consisting of well-known representatives of the scientific community in different fields of ocean science and ocean literacy, that will provide expert advice on the most relevant themes to be included in the calls for project funding proposals.

Projects eligible for financial support will be selected through calls for proposals with the support of the Scientific Committee. The Fund’s Executive Committee, its governance body, will take decisions by consensus.

The establishment of the Fund – which will welcome new partners from January 2026 – will increase coherence and reduce fragmentation among projects, offering a structured and systematic approach to financing. It will create synergies to improve cooperation among stakeholders from different sectors, being a crossover between institutions, private companies, academia, NGOs, educators and the scientific community at large.

Ms. Audrey Azoulay, UNESCO Director-General, commented: “We must protect the ocean and rethink our relationship with it – and this change starts in the classroom. Through our SEABEYOND programme, UNESCO and Prada are empowering a new generation to better understand and protect the ocean. This programme will fund youth-led initiatives on every continent, enhancing ocean education and culture. ”

Mr. Lorenzo Bertelli, Head of Corporate Social Responsibility of the Prada Group and Executive Director, Patron of the Ocean Decade Alliance, declared: “The ultimate goal of the Fund is to reunite new partners who share SEA BEYOND values and mission, and together create an even larger movement for ocean preservation and education, building on what the Prada Group and UNESCO have achieved since 2019. Through the Fund, we aim not only to design impactful projects, but to scale them by embedding ocean literacy into global culture and policy. This is a long-term commitment – because every child empowered through ocean literacy brings us one step closer to a more sustainable and conscious future.”

The Fund is now established with a duration of five years.

The first call for proposals will be published on UNESCO's website by December 2025.

¹Challenge 10 of UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030) states: “Restore humanity’s relationship with the ocean”.

About Blue Education

The Blue Education programmes delivered by UNESCO are already reaching a large number of children and educators around the world: the Blue Schools Global Network has national coordination bodies in 17 countries across 5 continents (Angola, Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Cape Verde, Honduras, India, Ireland, Malaysia, Maldives, Mexico, Morocco, Namibia, Nigeria, Portugal, South Africa and the USA), as well as two wider regional networks covering the European Union and the Caribbean, involving more than 2400 schools, 7800 teachers and 350,000 students. In April 2025, Brazil became the first country in the world recognized by UNESCO to commit to including Ocean Literacy in its national curriculum (the Blue Curriculum), integrating it into schools across the country and adapting it to regional and local contexts.

SEA BEYOND

SEA BEYOND is a project by Prada Group conducted in partnership with the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO (UNESCO-IOC) since 2019 to raise awareness of sustainability and ocean preservation, contributing to the progress of ocean education on a global scale through a series of training initiatives for younger generations. Since its debut, the educational program has shared the principles of ocean literacy with more than 35,000 students around the world. Moreover, the “Kindergarten of the Lagoon” project – outdoor education activities for preschool children in Venice – was launched in 2023 to create links between kids and the lagoon ecosystem. While the main focus remains education, SEA BEYOND has recently extended its scope to new areas of focus: support for scientific research, community engagement activities and policy advocacy dedicated to the ocean. As of July 2023, 1% of the proceeds from the Prada Re-Nylon for SEA BEYOND Collection benefit SEA BEYOND. The list of products in this Collection is available at www.prada.com. Through SEA BEYOND, Prada Group has also trained its more than 14,000 employees worldwide on ocean literacy principles via VR educational content and the AWorld app, the official platform selected by the United Nations to live more sustainably.

PRADA GROUP

Prada Group is socially engaged to contribute to the sustainable development of communities and stimulate cultural debate in all its forms of expression. The Group partners with recognized players and international entities to develop educational and training programs, promote talent, support scientific research, foster women’s empowerment, and promote local culture and artistic heritage. Prada Group operates in the luxury sector through the Prada, Miu, Church’s, Car Shoe, Marchesi 1824 and Luna Rossa brands.
www.pradagroup.com

UNESCO

With 194 Member States, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization contributes to peace and security by leading multilateral cooperation on education, science, culture, communication and information. Headquartered in Paris, UNESCO has offices in 54 countries and employs over 2300 people. UNESCO oversees more than 2000 World Heritage sites, Biosphere Reserves and Global Geoparks; networks of Creative, Learning, Inclusive and Sustainable Cities; and over 13 000 associated schools, university chairs, training and research institutions, with a global network of 200 National Commissions. Its Director-General is Audrey Azoulay.“Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defenses of peace must be constructed” – UNESCO Constitution, 1945.
More information: www.unesco.org

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