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Rebuilding marine life

Island and Ocean Ecosystems

Available Online

Duarte, C M. Agusti, S. Barbier, E. et al

Sustainable development Goal 14 of the United Nations aims to "conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development". Achieving this goal will require rebuilding the marine life-support system that deliver the many benefits that society receives from a healthy ocean. Here we document the recovery of marine population, habitats and ecosystems following past conservation interventions. Mitigating the major pressures like climate change could help in achieving structure and functional marine life by 2050. By rebuilding marine life represents a doable Grand Challenge for humanity, an ethical obligation and a smart economic ojective to achieve a sustainable future.

PacWastePlus Connection newsletter - Issue 2 2020

SPREP Publications, Waste Management and Pollution Control

Available Online

Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme

In battling the COVID-19 around the world we see the impacts of this pandemic to our ecosystems. As people are staying home it gives time to our ecosystem to bounce back and recover itsef. But in attempt to to reduce possible transmission, the rise of disposables is on the increase, in countries where fast-food chains and restaurants still remain open, they are switching to entirely disposable packaging and away from re-useale items. But in re-opening our boarders as an increase in disposables we will see littering, marine pollution and will continue to exacerbate damage to our fragile ecosystem. Not only the impacts of the global pandemis, but also the devastation caused by Tropical cyclone Harold on our friends, Solomon Is, Vanuatu, Fiji and Tonga. But due to restriction of travel it has been diffucult to provide assistance to these countries. However staff from WMPC, JPRISM II and PWP stand ready to support with remote technical advice whenever needed.

Ecosystem services for human health in Oceania

Available Online

McFarlare, R A. Horwitz, P. Arabena, K. et al

The state of the ecosystem and the health and well-being of people that depend on them are fumdamentally linked. However these links are often obscured - geographically as globalised table separates production of goods and ecosystem services from consumers across time as physical and mental impacts accumulate across lifespans, and through the complexity of competing socio-economic and cultural influences.

The Disaster Riskscape Across Asia-Pacific - Pathways for resilience, inclusion and empowerment

Alisjahbana, A S.

The Asia-Pacific region continues to be hit by a relentless sequence of disasters: cyclones, earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, droghts, dust storms and heatwaves. These disasters can strike anyone, anywhere, but they do their greatest damage in the poorest communities -- often those of minority groups, or of people living in remote areas, or in the fragile marginal zones of the region's rapidly expanding cities. Disaster resilience can also benefit from rapid advances in technology. Even the poorest countries can be empowered by smart digital technologies. Artificial intelligence and big data techniques, for wxample, can build a live picture of rapidly developing events by merging satellite imagery with data from mobile phones. At the same time, digital identity systems, can offer more ways to deliver essential social protection services before, during and after disasters.

Functional diversity of marine megafauna in the Anthropocene

Available Online

Plmlento, C. Leprleur, F. Silvestro, D. et.al

Marine megafauna, the largest animals in the ocea, serve key roles in ecosystem functioning. Yet, one-third of these animals are at risk if extinction. To better understand the potential consequences of megafauna loss, here we quantify their current functional diersity, predict future changes under different extinction scenarios, and intoduce a new metric [functionally unique, speciallized and endangered (FUSE) that identifies threatened species of partcular importance for functional diversity. Simulated extinction scenarios forecast marked declines in functional richness if current trajectories are maintained during the next century (11% globally uo to 24% regionnally) with more marked reductions (48% gloallly up to 70% at the poles) beyond random expectations if all threatened species eventually go extinct. Among the megafaunal groups, sharks will incur a disproportionate loss of functional richness. We identify top FUSE species and suggest a renewed focus on these species to preserve the ecosystem functions provided by marine megafauna.

Motivations to Support Marine Conservation Projects in North Tarawa, Kiribati.

Available Online

Teuea, T. Nakamura, N

Local communities support for resource conservation projects are esential for their success. Nevertheless in the Pacific Island countries many community-based conservation (CBC) projects remain ineffective due to the lack of community memebers engagement. To better understand the motivations of local community memebers to support resource conservation projects; this research looks at 4 community-based conservation sites in North Tarawa, Kiribati. Conducted and did semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions to investigate why community members support (or do not sipport) CBC . The results reveal that while local community memebers are overall aware of the significance of resource conservatons, they don't support or participate in conservations projects. Local community members motivation to participate in such projects are influenced by various of factors, including their status in a household or community, village practices, th e quality of community leadership and their past experiences with similar projects. Our research also finds that community members to become unsupportive with conservation projects when their daily livelihood activities are restricted by the projects. This research suggests that the project organisers need to understand such factors and need to be more strategic to retain community members' support for the success of the conservation project.

Inform Project Environmental Information for Decision Making

Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP)

Knowledge and understanding are important for driving and bringing about informed decision making. The project Building National and Regional Capacity to Implement Multilateral Environment Agreements by Strenghtening and Reporting in the Pacific, referred to as the Inform project, recognises the need for this data-driven decision making. The project will establish the Pacific island network of national and regional data repositories and reporting tools to support the monitoring, evaluation, and analysis environmental information, which supports environmental planning, forecasting, and reporting requirements.

Links between ecological integrity, emerging infectious disease and other aspects of human health - an overview of the literature

Available Online

Evans, T. Olson, S. Watson, J. et al

Environmental degradation has significantly altered ecological systems worldwide and continues to expand into new areas. Majority of infectious disease threars are zoonotic and often cause a major social and economic impacts. Ecological degradation by humans increases overall emerging zoonotic disease risks. The increased risk results from multiple interacting pathways including increased human contact with pathogens and disruption in pathogen ecology. Degradation of ecosystem also has complex effects, feedback loops and some notable negative impacts on many other aspects of human health, including; the prevalence of long established (endemic0 zoonotic diseases, vector-borne and water-borne diseases; air quality, nutrition, menatl health and access to traditional medicines as well as effects on human health through the impacts of climate change. In avoiding environmental degradation (by keeping ecosystems as intact as poddible and avoid creation of high risk interface zones and high risk activities that increases human wildlife contact), combined with broader One Health approaches that address the full range of risk factors, will help to reduce risk to humanity from emerging zoonoses and can have othe beneficial health outcomes as well. Hence protecting ecological integrity should be a a proority action within any comprehensive plan to avoid future zoonotic outbreaks, alongside other critical measures such as addressing the wildlife trade, building surveillance and response system providing global access to health care and mitigating disease risks associated with domestic animals.

Ocean commitments under the Paris Agreement.

Available Online

Levin, A L. Victor, G D. Gallo, N D.

Under the Paris Agreement nations made pledges known as nationally determined contributions (NDCs), which indicate how national governments are evaluating climate risks and policy opportunities. We find that NDCs reveal important systematic patterns reflecting national interests and capabilities. Because the ocean plays critical roles in climate mitigation and adaptation, we created a quantitative marine focus factor (MFF) to evaluate how governments address marine issues. In contrast to the past, when oceans received minimal attention in climate negotiations, 70% of 161 NDCs we analysed include marine issues. The percentage of the population living in low-lying areasvulnerable to rising seaspositively influences the MFF, but negotiating group (Annex 1 or small island developing states) is equally important, suggesting political motivations are crucial to NDC development. The analysis reveals gaps between scientific and government attention, including on ocean deoxygenation, which is barely mentioned. Governments display a keen interest in expanding marine research on climate priorities.

Promoting sustainable and inclusive oceans management in Pacific Islands through women and science.

Available Online

Michalena, Evanthie

Morris, Cherie W.

Singh, Priyatma

Straza, Tiffany R.A.

The question of how to efficiently and effectively manage ocean resources in a sustainable way, has reached therefore front of discussion at an international level, but women's contributions to this process have been under-estimated or unrecognized. Inclusive management plays a major role in the effective creation, use and adoption of environmental governance, necessitating efforts to measure, monitor and advance inclusivity. In many Pacific island states, there is a lack of disaggregated data collection and management to assist reliable and liable gender-responsive decision-making by national and regional authorities. This lack of information leads to unquantified female contributions and unexplored potential for women to actively contribute to sustainable ocean management as traditional leaders, researchers or science-based managers and in accordance with traditional customs, cultures and processes. This paper examines the contribution of gender-disaggregated data in both (1) effective management of natural resources and (2) measurement and monitoring of the active involvement of women in ocean management. We seek to shift the question from simply (How)are oceans used by women? to How can we build a clear path towards inclusive oceans management using science?, drawing data mainly from gender and ocean management practices in Pacific Small Island Developing States. This work also seeks to ground in reality the increasing national and international evocations about social equity and avoidance of gender discrimination. Given the existing relationships of Pacific peoples with the ocean and the emerging status of ocean science-based governance, wider integration of science and women in marine management can make an interesting and positive impact in this region

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