News

The Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) is deeply concerned about the impact of the Hunga Tonga - Hunga Ha’apai underwater volcano eruption, and tsunami, on the people of the Kingdom of Tonga.

Despite being widespread across the Pacific and Indian oceans, coconut crabs are disappearing across their range, according to a new conservation assessment that warns they’re vulnerable to extinction.

There has been a mixed response to Australia’s $700 million plan to combat water pollution on the Great Barrier Reef, the world’s largest reef system. The nine-year Australian plan promises to fund projects that reduce erosion and pesticides and fertilizers running off farmland into the sea.

Seabed mining can affect fisheries and the flow-on social equity issues need to be addressed. What is currently hundreds of meters down below the ocean floor could soon be found in our electronics and on construction sites.

A coral reef site in pristine condition has been opened to the eyes of the world in French Polynesia by a series of photos for UNESCO taken by Alexis Rosenfeld.

Papua New Guinea has been the world’s largest tropical timber exporter since 2014. More than 70% of the timber produced in the country is considered illegal.

Western Sydney University researchers have contributed to a world-first study that estimates there are 73,000 tree species on Earth, including about 9,200 species yet to be discovered, of which 1,500 species are likely to be concentrated in northeast Australia and the Pacific Islands.

The Government has finalised a Protected Areas Bill 2022 to establish and manage a national system of “protected areas” in the country, Environment, Conservation and Climate Change Minister Wera Mori says.

Effective Pacific fisheries monitoring and surveillance coupled with improved data reporting are among reasons cited by a recently released fisheries study that says the problem of illegal fishing in the Pacific is far less than a 2016 report that estimated losses of over US$600 million a year.&n

Plans to harvest trees at Gizo’s Mile 6 area in Western Province are no longer on the agenda of the Western Provincial Government.