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In a study supported by the FFPS Oryx 100% fund the authors investigated the impact of traditional hunting practices on native land birds in Samoa. Hunting and habitat modification have contributed to the near extinction of several endemic species.

Marine protected areas (MBA) provide place-based management of marine ecosystem through various degrees and types of protective actions. Habitats such as coral reefs are especially susceptible to degradation resulting from climate change, as evidenced by mass bleaching events over the past two decades. Marine ecosystems are being altered by direct effecrs of climate change including ocean warming, ocean acidification rising sea level, changing circulation patterns, increasing severity of storms, and changing freshwater influxes.

Private PES schemes do not require a specific legal framework beyond basic contract law, but they are usually limited to local water problems. However, scaling their positive results up through a nested approach may require a specific policy and legal framework. PES trading schemes require a specific legal framework as they are rather complex and usually need to be established at the regional or national scale. An appropriate legislative framework which regulates public PES schemes has the potential to stimulate the development of trustworthy markets and to ensure good governance.

Recently impacts of climate change, in particular, sea level rise, a major concern for many Pacific island countries. In early 2000, there were a series of media coverage over sea level rise issues using Tuvalu as an example.