The Asian Development Bank (ADB) launched the Action Plan for Healthy Oceans and Sustainable Blue Economies (Healthy Oceans Action Plan) in 2019 to scale up investments and technical assistance to $5 billion between 2019 and 2024.1 The action plan aims to protect and restore coastal and marine ecosystems, promote inclusive livelihood opportunities, grow sustainable blue economies, build resilient coastal communities, and contribute to food security in Asia and the Pacific.

To support the Healthy Oceans Action Plan and to catalyze finance for bankable ocean projects, ADB created the Ocean Finance Initiative (OFI), which aims to improve the amount and efficacy of ocean finance.2 ADB Ocean Finance Framework (this publication) is an output of the OFI.

This framework has been designed to be consistent with, and supportive of (i) the global Sustainable Blue Economy Finance Principles, of which ADB is a signatory, and (ii) the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.3 Building upon global principles, the ADB Ocean Finance framework provides detailed, ADB-specific guidance on the types of projects that ADB defines as “blue” or “ocean” investments.

ADB has a separate, but related framework to define the eligibility of projects for inclusion in blue bonds: the ADB Green and Blue Bond Framework, which is consistent with the 2021 International Capital Markets Association Green Bond Principles.4 The Ocean Finance Framework includes additional investment types (e.g., grants) and project objectives (e.g., coastal and marine tourism) which are not eligible for blue bonds, meaning the blue bond pipeline is a subset of the ocean pipeline