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The Ninth Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Waigani Convention was held on 15 September, 2017 in Apia, Samoa.The 13 Parties to the Convention are Australia, Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, New Zealand, Niue, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu. Present at the Meeting were representatives from Australia, Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Kiribati, New Zealand, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga and Tuvalu. A full list of participants can be found in Annex I...

The Twenty-eighth SPREP Meeting of Officials (28SM) was held from 19-21 September 2017, in Apia, Samoa. Present at the Meeting were representatives from American Samoa, Australia, Cook Islands, Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, France, French Polynesia, Kiribati, Republic of the Marshall Islands, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Niue, Papua New Guinea, Palau, Samoa, Tokelau, Tonga, Tuvalu, United Kingdom, United States and Wallis and Futuna.

The Noumea Convention was negotiated under the framework of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Regional Seas Programme and adopted in 1986. The Convention and its two related Protocols - Protocol for the Prevention of Pollution of the South Pacific Region by Dumping and the Protocol Concerning Cooperation in Combating Pollution Emergencies in the South Pacific Region - entered into force on 22 August, 1990. The 12 Parties to the Convention are Australia, Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, France, Republic of the Marshall Islands, Nauru, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands and United States

The first and second editions of the Handbook, on which this Pacific version is substantially based, were prepared as a practical introduction to negotiating or working on Mulitlateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs). They were prepared for people with little or no technical background in negotiations.They were also intended to function as a key reference tool for experienced negotiators. As a result the subject matter is developed at a relatively broad level. However, technical information and language was retained and used in context, with understanding facilitated by a comprehensive glossary prepared by UNEP. This new handbook preserves these key aspects but has enhanced the accessiblity of information and, were appropriate, used examples and material of particular relevance to the Pacific Region

Invasive species compete with endemic species and if successful can displace native species in the host region (Cororaton et al., 2009).

This 5th National Report for the Republic of the Marshall Islands provides an update on the biodiversity status and trends, as well as progress towards the implementation of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020 including the Aichi Biodiversity Target 2020. The report is divided into three main parts with part one focusing on the importance of biodiversity to the people, the state and threats to biodiversity and implication of changes to biodiversity; part two focuses on theactions and implementation of national biodiversity strategy and action plan; and part three focuses on alignment of national targets to the Aichi Biodiversity Targets. This report is the end product of a consultative process undertaken through the development of the national blueprint for conservation areas plan and the 2016 State of Environment report for RMI.

Climate change and disaster risk management are issues of high priority to the Solomon Islands Government, given the current and future impacts expected, and the associated risks posed to natural ecosystems such as coastal and marine environments, fisheries, agriculture, water resources, health, biodiversity, infrastructure and industry.

Barrow Island, north-west coast of Australia, is one of the world’s significant conservation areas, harboring marsupials that have become extinct or threatened on mainland Australia as well as a rich diversity of plants and animals, some endemic. Access to construct a Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) plant, Australia’s largest infrastructure development, on the island was conditional on no non-indigenous species (NIS) becoming established. We developed a comprehensive biosecurity system to protect the island’s biodiversity. From 2009 to 2015 more than 0.5 million passengers and 12.2 million tonnes of freight were transported to the island under the biosecurity system, requiring 1.5 million hrs of inspections. No establishments of NIS were detected. We made four observations that will assist development of biosecurity systems. Firstly, the frequency of detections of organisms corresponded best to a mixture log-normal distribution including the high number of zero inspections and extreme values involving rare incursions. Secondly, comprehensive knowledge of the island’s biota allowed estimation of false positive detections (62% native species). Thirdly, detections at the border did not predict incursions on the island. Fourthly, the workforce detected more than half post-border incursions (59%). Similar approaches can and should be implemented for all areas of significant conservation value.

Many neglected tropical zoonotic pathogens are maintained by introduced mammals, and on islands the most common introduced species are rodents, cats, and dogs. Management of introduced mammals, including control or eradication of feral populations, which is frequently done for ecological restoration, could also reduce or eliminate the pathogens these animals carry. Understanding the burden of these zoonotic diseases is crucial for quantifying the potential public health benefits of introduced mammal management. However, epidemiological data are only available from a small subset of islands where these introduced mammals co-occur with people. We examined socioeconomic and climatic variables as predictors for disease burdens of angiostrongyliasis, leptospirosis, toxoplasmosis, toxocariasis, and rabies from 57 islands or island countries. We found strong correlates of disease burden for leptospirosis, Toxoplasma gondii infection, angiostrongyliasis, and toxocariasis with more than 50% of the variance explained, and an average of 57% (range = 32–95%) predictive accuracy on out-of-sample data. We used these relationships to provide estimates of leptospirosis incidence and T. gondii seroprevalence infection on islands where nonnative rodents and cats are present. These predicted estimates of disease burden could be used in an initial assessment of whether the costs of managing introduced mammal reservoirs might be less than the costs of perpetual treatment of these diseases on islands.

Invasive alien species (IAS) are animals, plants or other organisms that are introduced into places outside their natural range, negatively impacting native biodiveristy, ecosystem services or human well-being. IAS are one of the biggest causes of biodiversity loss and species extinctions and are also a global threat to food security and livelihoods. IAS are compounded by climate change. Climate change facilitates the spread and establishement of many alien species and creates new opportunities for them to become invasive. IAS can reduce the resilience of natural habitats, agricultural systems and urban areas to climate change. Conversely, climate change reduces the resilience of habitats to biological invasions. It is essential that IAS be incorporated in to climate change policies. This includes biosecurity measures to prevent the introduction of IAS to new regions as a result of climate change, and rapid response measures to monitor and eradicate alien species that may become invasive due to climate change.