An international project to help protect the Sargasso Sea received $3 million through a first-of-a-kind grant.

The Sargasso Sea Commission was given the cash fund from the Global Environment Facility.

The cash will be accompanied by $25 million of finance from a range of partners.

The grant is the first from the Global Environment Facility and was designed to help create a ”high seas ecosystem“.

Dr David Freestone, the executive secretary of the Sargasso Sea Commission, said: “This grant opens tremendous possibilities for the Sargasso Sea Commission and will greatly aid the commission and its partners in their work to conserve the Sargasso Sea.”

The Commission was established in 2014 after the signing of the Hamilton Declaration in Bermuda to preserve the Sargasso Sea, in the northwest Atlantic, as a conservation area because of its “unique” collection of biodiversity.

The declaration included signatures from representatives from the UK, the Azores, the Caribbean and North America.

The group sought funding in March 2019 from the Global Environment Facility and had been preparing to receive the funds since December last year.

The grant will be used to finance an analysis of the threats to the Sargasso Sea, find ways to tackle them and develop a programme to protect and monitor the area.

The project will involve representatives from the ten governments that signed the Hamilton Declaration, as well as several members of the Sargasso Sea Commission and representatives from organisations such as the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Studies and the University of Edinburgh.