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Climate change is often referred to as the defining challenge of our time, and it is well known that Pacific Island States are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change. Indeed, these adverse effects are already very tangible for most communities across the region. Coastal features are visibly changing, with rising sea-levels, higher king tides and storm surges, saltwater intrusion and changing weather patterns posing an increasing threat to the livelihoods of Pacific Island communities. The threats are amplified by extreme weather events becoming more intense and more damaging as a result of climate change, with Cyclone Pam recently causing loss of human life and catastrophic damage in Vanuatu, and to a lesser extent in the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and Kiribati. 2 While communities and governments—assisted by regional, international and nongovernmental organizations—are proactively building resilience and adapting to climate change, there is a real risk of much more severe and damaging impacts materializing in the coming decades.3 The threats are so severe that most, if not all, Pacific Island States face the threat of losing some or all of their habitable territory as a result of climate change, with related risks of the loss of traditional livelihoods and large-scale involuntary displacement

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The Asian Development Bank through its contractor, the Snowy Mountain Engineering.Corporation were tasked with exploring the potential of augmenting the capacity of the Afulilo Reservoir to power a third turbine at the Ta’elafaga Hydro-power Station. To assist in this augmentation assessment, SMEC arranged with the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Program to oversight a consortium of partners to conduct a 11 month monitoring program with the purpose of assessing the status of the marine environment, particularly the coral reefs, as well as water quality in the Fagaloa and Uafato Bays. The data from the 2009-1010 marine monitoring program implies that several sites in Fagaloa Bay are exhibiting signs of various impacts from various inputs into the marine environment, which are most notable at sites 1, 2, and 14. These sites are closest to the apex of Fagaloa Bay where the Ta’elefaga Creek discharges into. Impacts for these sites include low or no coral cover and recruitment, growth in algal cover, lower salinity levels, higher rates of sedimentation and turbidity, as well as high nutrient inputs. Fish biomass at site 14 was also the lowest (sites 1 and 2 were not surveyed due to poor visibility). Other specific results across all sites include a reduction in live coral cover, a general shift to more hardier coral species, and low fish bio-mass when compared with other sites in Samoa.

The Pacific Islands region is located in the western and central Pacific Ocean. The 15 Independent countries and eight territories that make up this region are delineated into three major culture areas, these are Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia (Table 1) and have a combined Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of approximately 29 million km

At its 14th meeting held in the Hague, the Netherlands in June 2007, the Conference of the Parties to CITES adopted decision 14.80 that directed the CITES Secretariat to seek external funding to enable a workshop to be held in the Pacific, in collaboration with appropriate regional organizations, to initiate regional cooperation on the management of sustainable fisheries for giant clams (Tridacnidae).

2008 Annual Report for the University of the South Pacific.

It is now widely acknowledged that the causes of climate change are mostly anthropogenic in nature and that its effects will have far reaching consequences across the globe. Governments have been exhorted by the world’s scientists to expedite and scale up implementation of mitigation measures and prepare to adapt in order to “avoid the unmanageable and manage the unavoidable” (SEG 2007). This will require concerted and coordinated action by all parties affected at the global, regional, sub-regional, and national and community levels. While international cooperation is essential, each country will need to prepare for and adapt to environmental and socio-economic changes brought about by changes in temperatures, sea level, weather patterns, etc, which are expected to impact people and environment in different ways. The extent to which a country is able to mobilise and manage resources to mitigate and/or adapt to these impacts will depend largely on the capacity of its institutions and people, commonly described in this report as “institutional capacity”.

In the future no country will be immune from the impact of human-induced climate change. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is unequivocal in its pronouncement that global warming will cause significant climate changes throughout the world, including increases in air, sea surface and ocean temperatures and influencing pattern of precipitation, wind flow and ocean salinity (IPCC 2007). The world is expected to experience increased climate variability as well as extreme weather events, such as prolonged drought, heavy rains and heat waves, and the increased frequency and intensity of tropical cyclones. Sea level rise is also predicted. The effects of such changes will be significant to all the Pacific Island countries and territories (PICTs), although the nature and degree of the socioeconomic impact of climate change cannot be predicted with any certainty at this point in time