The Maritime Zones Act (MZA) 2018 for Cooks Islands repeals the Territorial Sea and Exclusive Economic Zone Act 1977, (Act No. 16 of 14 November 1977). It states that the exclusive economic zone comprises of those areas of the sea, seabed, and subsoil that are beyond and adjacent to the territorial sea having, as their outer limits, a line measured seaward from the territorial sea baseline, every point of which is distant 200 nautical miles from the nearest point of the baseline.
The CKI OECM Workshop Report consolidates the discussions, outcomes, recommendations and next steps following the Other Effective Area-based Conservation Measures Workshop, hosted by the National Environment Service, in partnership with Secretariat of Pacific Regional Environment Program and the UNEP World Conservation Monitoring Centre, on the 24th - 25th January 2023 in Rarotonga, Cook Islands.
Official project document for the Cook Islands national project under GEF-7 programming, project title: Enhancing Biodiversity considerations and effective protected area management to safeguard the Cook Islands integrated ecosystems and species. Annexes not included.
All materials related to the GEF 8 National Dialogue, hosted by the National Environment Service with support from the GEF Secretariat at Edgewater Resort on the 19th & 20th April 2023, including the presentation slides, report and activity sheets will be hosted here.
Protected areas that are active and proposed on Pohnpei main island
Pohnpei
State of Environment (SoE) reports provide in-country partners with a process to gather data on current environmental indicators, document their status, and formulate a plan for keeping these indicators on track or developing policies and programs as needed. This SoE Toolkit dataset contains resources that serve as guides to help create up-to-date State of Environment reports.
The World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA) is the most comprehensive global database of marine and terrestrial protected areas, updated on a monthly basis, and is one of the key global biodiversity data sets being widely used by scientists, businesses, governments, International secretariats and others to inform planning, policy decisions and management.
Dataset contains training material on using open source Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to improve protected area planning and management from a workshop that was conducted on February 26-28, 2020. Specifically, the dataset contains lectures on GIS fundamentals, QGIS 3.x, and global positioning system (GPS), as well as country-specific datasets and a workbook containing exercises for viewing data, editing/creating datasets, and creating map products in QGIS.
The National Environment Service issues permits for the export of CITES species out of the Cook Islands. CITES stands for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.
This report provides information on permits issued by the NES in 2022.
The Palmerston rat eradication program ran from August-September 2023. NZ Department of Conservation's Emmanuel Oyston, field team leader of the eradication, sent weekly updates on their progress - their updates are available here.
The Strandings of Oceania database is a collaborative project between SPREP, WildMe and the South Pacific Whale Research Consortium to record stranding and beachcast data for whales, dolphins and dugongs throughout the Pacific. We use a platform called Flukebook. An account is needed to view or use data within Flukebook but the data is available for download here. You can submit data direct into Flukebook (preferably while logged in) or send a completed data form to SPREP for upload. Guidance on using the database is available :
Under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) - member countries are implementing the PoWPA. This is FSM's Action Plan for PoWPA and Target 11. Target 11 is a contribution towards ensuring that ecosystems, species and genetic diversity are safeguarded in both the land and seascape by ensuring that key habitats are protected and that species migration and movement can occur. Protected areas are a cornerstone of 5 conservation actions and as such are one of the main tools at a country’s disposal to reduce habitat loss.
Part 4 of the Tuvalu Maritime Zones Act 2012 states that the exclusive economic zone of Tuvalu comprises those areas of the sea, seabed and subsoil that are beyond and adjacent to the territorial sea, having as their outer limits a line measured seaward from the baseline; which is measured from the low-water line of the seaward side of the reef fringing the coast of any part of Tuvalu or bounding any lagoon waters adjacent to any part of that coast, or where a reef is not present, the low-water line of the coast itself every point of which is not more than 200 nautical miles from the neares
The National Environment Service is working closely with family representatives of the Takitumu Conservation Area, to submit an assessment application that will give the TCA official international recognition as an Other Effective area-based Conservation Measure.
All documents relevant to the submission process will be stored here, including resources on the TCA, which are referred to in the assessment form.
A team from Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research travelled to Rarotonga during July/August 2023 to carry out monitoring of biocontrols released in previous years. The team used drones to conduct monitoring surveillance for the invasive African Tulip tree species, using LiDAR and other imagery techniques.
This newsletter also provides an update on the control of the biocontrols.
This dataset holds three reports on invasive species in Micronesia. . The objectives were three-fold: * To identify species on the islands that are presently causing problems * To identify species that, even though they are not presently a major problem, could spread to other islands where they are not present, potentially causing problems * To look for invasive species known to cause problems in ecosystems similar to the islands visited.
In December 2017 the 100 Island Challenge partnered with American Samoa Department of Marine & Wildlife Resources Coral Reef Advisory Group to survey reefs around the islands of Savai'i and Upolu of Samoa.
State of Environment Reports
This dataset hosts all the published NBSAP of Samoa.
This report is the review of terrestrial biological information in Samoa and was written by MNRE with the technical support of Conservation International (CI).