Search the SPREP Catalogue

Both Samoa and American Samoa have relatively diverse shark and ray communities with management plans in place to protect chondrichthyans. These include participation in Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission initiatives, spatial protections, and community-based management programs. Implications. Current management approaches have the potential to provide significant protection to sharks and rays, however, their effectiveness may be hindered by a lack of proper enforcement, or compliance at the national and community levels.

This paper is a further contribution to the naturalised flora of Tonga in documenting 19 species newly recognised from the archipelago. These 19 species are treated as the single broad category of naturalised whereby they form a wild population(s) self-maintained by seed or vegetative reproduction (following Webb et al. 1988).

Climate change loss and damage (L&D) due to both sudden slow-onset events are a growing concern for vulnerable countries.

Many Commonwealth member states face the burnt of the climate crisis. In the Pacific Island states and the wider Pacific region, the frequency of severe weather events has increased. For instance, in 2023 the island of Vanuatu was impacted by cyclones Judy and Kevin in March and afterwards by cyclone Lola.

Plastic production and plastic pollution negatively affect our environment, environmental justice, and climate change. Using detailed global and regional plastics datasets coupled with socio-economic data, we employ machine learning to predict that, without intervention, annual mismanaged plastic waste will nearly double to 121 Mt (100 - 139 Mt 95% CI) by 2050. Annual greenhouse gas emissions from the plastic system are projected to grow by 37% to 3.35 Gt CO2 equivalent (3.09 - 3.54 CO2e) over the same period. The United Nations plastic pollution treaty presents a unique opportunity to reshape these outcomes. We simulate eight candidate treaty policies and find that just four could together reduce mismanaged plastic waste by 91% (86% - 98%) and gross plastic-related greenhouse gas emissions by one third.

Opinion - In the Pacific, our relationship with nature is a natural one. Nature is us, we are nature. We use nature to meet our basic needs, food, water, clothing and shelter. We communicate through nature, we use it for medicine, transportation, music and entertainment. Generations have used those natural signs, which in today's world we refer to as traditional knowledge, to plan for the future.

The application of remote sensing methods to detect invasive plant species was heavily reliant on species ecology, extent of invasion and available geospatial and remotely sensed image data.

The study analyzes Hawai'i Island data on stranding locations, dates, sizes, sex, health and the causes of the strandings. A total of 754 stranded green turtles were reported from 1983-2022: 379 stranded on the east coast of Hawai'i island and 375 on the west coast. The authors find that strandings peaked in 2011 and 2018 abd were highest from March to August.

This article provides a history of Pacific Island climate diplomacy. Other histories of Pacific climate diplomacy have been written but this is the first to provide a general overview of the Pacific's role in global climate diplomacy at the United Nations (UN) and consider the implications of climate diplomacy for international relations in the Pacific.

Understanding perceived equity is key, equity subjective, context-dependent and has implications for legitimacy, cooperation and wellbeing. Since gender in combination with other social characteristics, influence how people benefit or participate in management, examining perceived fairness from an intersectional perspective is crucial.