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Solomon Islands is one of the seven countries of the South West Pacific Node of the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network (GCRMN). The country coordination is carried out by the World Wild Fund for Nature (WWF) Gizo Office in the Western Province. All coral reef monitoring activities are carried out by WWF Gizo staff with very little interaction with other stakeholders in way of information sharing.

In 2000, the Fiji Islands was at the northern edge of a large pool of unusually warm water, and suffered extensive hard coral death due to coral bleaching. A paper composed of a collection of studies from across the Fiji islands, linking this coral death to elevated sea temperatures at the time, was published (Cummings et al 2000). The difficulty of gathering data from very different sources, and which had been recorded using many different methods, established the need for standardised and regular surveys of representative sites across the Fijian archipelago, in order to measure long-term changes affecting the entire country.

CRISP program is a South Pacific regional initiative, which "aims to develop a vision for the future of [coral reefs] and the communities that depend on them and to introduce strategies and projects to conserve their biodiversity, while developing the economic and environmental services that they provide both locally and globally. Also, it is designed as a factor for integration between developed countries (Australia. New Zealand). French overseas territories and Pacific Island developing countries" (Anonymous) [1]. It takes place in ten country islands, in which Fiji and three French territories in the South Pacific (see map in appendix 1). CRISP was initially designed by the French Development Agency (AFD - Agence francaise de developpement) as part of an inter-ministerial effort beginning in 2002 (Anonymous) [1]. It currently associates many financial, financial and technical, technical and institutional partners

This consolidated report, for the first semester of 2007, comes out one month late because of the programme coordinator participation and involvement in the preparation of the Towns- ville Forum co-organised by Australia and France in September 2007 (see CRISP Enlightnings and CRISP Partnerships chapters further in this report).

The Rotuma Coral Reef Conservation Project (RCRCP) trip III to carry out the annual survey of Rotuma's coral reef was during from the month of November from the 14th to 22nd in 2006. The diving survey group consisted of four volunteer divers from mainland Fiji and one volunteer diver who lives on the island. All five divers volunteered their time to assist LajeRotuma Initiative (LRI) in its RCRCP activity. Three of the Suva-based divers are employees of the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and the fourth, a graduate student under the Coral Reef Initiative for the South Pacific (CRISP) programme, from the School of Marine Studies (SMS) at the University of the South Pacific (USP).

The monitoring and evaluation system of CRISP programme is semester based with 2 reports describing activities from the 1st of January to the 30th of June and the 1st of July to the 31st of December respectively. Actions occurring on the field are classified according to the type of activities, which are explained according to projects comprised into different compo- nents. Components are sub-divided into projects that are under the responsibility of supervisors and managers respectively. The pyramid-shaped programme of monitoring and evaluation plans to summarize activities put in place over each semester. In the first place, reports are submitted to the managers of each project then feedbacks are given to the supervisors of each component for submission and compilation by CRISP Coordination Unit (CCU) at the end of each semester. Each of these 2 stages take approximately one month and consolidating the reports take 2 months after the following deadlines, either September of the same year for the first semester or March of the year N+1 for the second semester. The translation of the consolidated report postpones the issue of English version by few weeks.

La zone est extrêmement variée et les enjeux le sont donc également. Toutefois certains d’entre eux sont présents dans presque tous les sites où le programme intervient : Pêches récifales de plus en plus problématiques Travaux sur l’état de santé des récifs, l’effet des pêches, l’effet des AMP, éparpillés et peu coordonnés, Coopération régionale très limitée malgré la similitude des problèmes et probablement des solutions Possibilité de renforcer la couverture des AMP dans le Pacifique Disponibilité de savoir faire (centre de recherche, ONG, entreprises, Etats), de réseaux (LMMA, ONG, GCRMN, etc.) et de moyens (commande politique de la France de coopérer régionalement sur le sujet, ONG internationales prêtes à cofinancer) Espèces phares en danger par endroit (tortues, dugong, etc.) Pressions : - Activités humaines : surtout surpêche ou pêche avec des techniques destructives mais aussi, pollution des eaux (agriculture intensive, problèmes miniers, etc.) - Facteurs climatiques: cyclones