The Joint Global Ocean Flux Study (JGOFS) was an international and multi-disciplinary programme with participants from more than 20 nations. JGOFS was launched in 1987 at a planning meeting in Paris under the auspices of the Scientific Committee of Oceanic Research (SCOR), a committee of the International Council for Science (ICSU). Two years later, JGOFS became one of the first core projects of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP). In the fall of 1988, long-term ocean time-series projects were established at sites near Bermuda and Hawaii, and the following year, the multinational North Atlantic Bloom Experiment (NABE) set up the standard for future process studies in other oceans.