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Cook Islands is composed of 15 islands with a total land area of approximately 23,600ha. which fall naturally into northern and southern groups. The total population at the 1991 census was 18,552, the overwhelming majority of whom live in the southern group, principally on Rarotonga. The area of the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) is over 1.8 million square kilometres. Though the recent rapid development of a black pearl industry in Cook Islands has been impressive, in general terms the marine resources in Cook Islands' EEZ have yet to be fully developed. Fisheries and marine resources are predominantly utilised by Cook Islanders on a subsistence and artisanal basis. Responsibility for these resources is vested in the (Minister) Ministry of Marine Resources (MMR), headquartered at Avatiu, Rarotonga. Outer islands with fisheries personnel are Pukapuka, Manihiki, Aitutaki, Penrhyn, Palmerston, Mitiaro, and occasionally, Mangaia.

Rarotonga and Aitutaki form the summits of separate volcanic masses rising from depths of 4000 m, at which depth the cones are 45-55 km in diameter (Summerhayes and Kibblewh 1966, 1967).The lower slopes of the cones average 15-25 increasing to 30 in the upper 750 m and becoming very steep the surface reef is approached. The Mauke-Aitutaki line of islands is thought to be of early Tertiary age: the surface volcanics are much eroded, with a subdued topography, or are capped with limestones (Wood, 1967; Wood and Hay, 1970). On Rarotonga, where the relief is much stronger (maximum altitude 640 m), radiometric ages of 2.3-2.8 million years date the 1 as Pliocene (Tarling, 1967). Mangaia, with a cap of Oligoce Miocene limestones, must be much older (Marshall, 1927). Evi dence from the deep-sea drilling programme indicates that th ocean floor in the area of the southern Cooks is Paleogene (22.5-65 million years) in age (Winterer, 1973), thus provid a maximum age for the islands. It is probable that the gross history of the Cooks resembles that of other, better-known reef-capped Pacific volcanic cones known to have been initia in the early Tertiary.