After 10 years of negotiations, the countries reached a historic agreement on the protection of the World Ocean.

The Treaty on the High Seas aims to make 30% of the seas protected areas by 2030, to protect and restore marine nature, the BBC writes.

The agreement was reached on Saturday night, after 38 hours of negotiations, at the UN headquarters in New York.

Negotiations have been going on for years due to disagreements over funding and fishing rights.

The last international agreement on ocean protection was signed 40 years ago in 1982 — the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.

That agreement established an area called the high seas — international waters where all countries have the right to fish, navigate and conduct research — but only 1.2% of those waters are protected.

Marine life outside these protected areas is at risk from climate change, overfishing and marine traffic.

The latest assessment of global marine species found that nearly 10% are threatened with extinction, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

The new protected areas created by the treaty will impose restrictions on fishing, shipping lanes and exploration activities, such as deep-sea mining - where minerals are extracted from the seabed at a depth of 200m or more.

Environmental groups were concerned that the mining process could disturb animal breeding grounds, create noise pollution and be toxic to marine life.

The countries' representatives will have to meet again to formally adopt the agreement, and then there will be a lot more work to do before the treaty can be implemented.