It was billed as “Connecting Europe for a Smart Ocean”, but beneath the polite title ran an urgent current – a call to act before the tide of marine decline turns irreversible. The timing was no accident: in just days, Kiel will send off the fleet for The Ocean Race Europe, a 4,500-mile offshore battle from the Baltic to the Adriatic. Inside the ZBW – Leibniz Information Center for Economics – the conversation was sharp and solutions-driven.