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World Seas: An Environmental Evaluation, Second Edition, Volume Two: The Indian Ocean to the Pacific provides a comprehensive review of the environmental condition of the seas from the Indian Ocean to the Pacific.

The Asia and Pacific region is extremely vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. Unabated warming could significantly undo previous achievements of economic development and improvements of living standards. At the same time, the region has both the economic capacity and weight of influence to change the present fossil-fuel based development pathway and curb global emissions. This report sheds light on the regional implications of the latest projections of changes in climate conditions over Asia and the Pacific. The assessment concludes that, even under the Paris consensus scenario in which global warming is limited to 1.5°C to 2°C above preindustrial levels, some of the land area, ecosystems, and socioeconomic sectors will be significantly affected by climate change impacts, to which policy makers and the investment community need to adapt to. However, under a Business-As-Usual (BAU) scenario, which will cause a global mean temperature rise of over 4°C by the end of this century, the possibilities for adaptation are drastically reduced. Among others, climate change impacts such as the deterioration of the Asian “water towers”, prolonged heat waves, coastal sea-level rise and changes in rainfall patterns could disrupt ecosystem services and lead to severe effects on livelihoods which in turn would affect human health, migration dynamics and the potential for conflicts. This assessment also underlines that, for many areas vital to the region’s economy, research on the effects of climate change is still lacking.

Until now, there has been only one source of data on global fishery catches: information reported to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations by member countries. An extensive, ten-year study conducted by The Sea Around Us Project of the University of British Columbia shows that this catch data is fundamentally misleading. Many countries underreport the amount of fish caught (some by as much as 500%), while others such as China significantly overreport their catches. The Global Atlas of Marine Fisheries is the first and only book to provide accurate, country-by-country fishery data. This groundbreaking information has been gathered from independent sources by the world’s foremost fisheries experts, and edited by Daniel Pauly and Dirk Zeller of the Sea Around Us Project. The Atlas includes one-page reports on 273 countries and their territories, plus fourteen topical global chapters. National reports describe the state of the country's fishery, by sector; the policies, politics, and social factors affecting it; and potential solutions. The global chapters address cross-cutting issues, from the economics of fisheries to the impacts of mariculture. Extensive maps and graphics offer attractive and accessible visual representations. While it has long been clear that the world’s oceans are in trouble, the lack of reliable data on fishery catches has obscured the scale, and nuances, of the crisis. The atlas shows that, globally, catches have declined rapidly since the 1980s, signaling an even more critical situation than previously understood. The Global Atlas of Marine Fisheries provides a comprehensive picture of our current predicament and steps that can be taken to ease it. For researchers, students, fishery managers, professionals in the fishing industry, and all others concerned with the status of the world’s fisheries, the Atlas will be an indispensable resource.

Fish is a mainstay of food secuity for Pacific island countries and territories (PICTs), Recent household income and expenditure surveys, and socio-economic surveys, demostrate that subsistence fishing still provides the great majority of dietary animal protein in the region. Forecasts of the fish required in 2030 to meet recommended per capita fish consumption, or to maintain current consumption, indicate that even well-managed coastal fisheries will only be able to meet the demand in 6 0f 22 PICTs. Governments of many PICTs will need to increase local access to tuna, and develop small-pond aquaculture, to provide food security. Diversifying the supply of fish will also make rural households in the Pacific more resilient to natural disasters, social and political instability, and the uncertainity of climate change

This document reviews actions taken by intergovernmental organizations (IGOs), including regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs) and other relevant regional fishery bodies (RFBs), to address problematic sea turtle and seabird interactions in marine capture fisheries. Sea turtles and seabirds are subject to a number of natural and anthropogenic mortality sources, including fishing operations. As a result, all sea turtle species of known status are recognized as being endangered. All sea turtle species excluding the flatback are listed in Appendix I of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), which regulates international trade. Of the 61 species of seabirds affected by longline fisheries, 26 are threatened with extinction, including 19 species of albatrosses. The Convention on Migratory Species, which has a broader remit than CITES in terms of its requirements for both domestic and multilateral conservation measures, lists all sea turtles, albatrosses, giant petrels and Procellaria petrels in its Appendices. Due to concern over the status of sea turtles and certain species of seabirds and the possible negative effects of fishing on these populations, several IGOs have taken measures to address these problems. Some of these organizations have begun examining seabird or sea turtle interactions, several have adopted voluntary measures to address problematic interactions, while five RFMOs have legally binding measures requiring the employment of seabird avoidance methods in pelagic and demersal longline and trawl fisheries. There currently are no legally binding measures in place by an IGO to manage turtle-fishery interactions or seabird interactions in coastal gillnet fisheries. Several IGOs, which lack fisheries management authority, serve as advisory mechanisms and conduct cooperative research, or have a primary responsibility of regional sea turtle or seabird conservation.

Since the 2002 Assessment of the Technology and Economic Assessment Panel (TEAP), a large number of technical developments have taken place. The direction many of these developments have taken could not have been predicted in 2002. The Panel's Technical Options Committees, on Chemicals (CTOC), on Foams (FTOC), on Halons (HTOC), on Methyl Bromide (MBTOC), on Medical Uses (MTOC) and on Refrigeration and AC (RTOC) have each issued a 2006 Assessment Report that document these developments. The Executive Summaries of these reports form the body of the 2006 TEAP Assessment Report and their Abstract Executive Summaries, with the summaries of other chapters, form the Executive Summary of the 2006 TEAP Assessment Report."

“Even if the control measures of the Montreal Protocol were to be implemented by all nations, today’s atmospheric abundance of chlorine (about 3 parts per billion by volume (ppbv) will at least double to triple during the next century. If the atmospheric abundance of chlorine reaches 9 ppbv by about 2050, ozone depletion of 0–4 percent in the tropics and 4–12 percent at high latitudes would be predicted, even without including the effects of heterogeneous chemical processes known to occur in polar regions, which may further increase the magnitude of the predicted ozone depletion.”

The baseline assessment provides a current status report on the coastal marine resources of Niue. It offers recommendations for the management options available to address the concerns of local villagers with respect to deterioration of coastal resources. The lessons learned from the pilot project are expected to have national importance and should provide a guide to the best approach to sustainable fisheries management for all of Niue.