Pacific lead in Waste Management

The Pacific region is the focus of cooperative waste management projects, including innovative recycling programmes, which are beginning to resolve long-standing waste problems in the region. This was revealed byKenichiro Koiwa of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) Environmental Management Group during a presentation to journalists at the JICA Head Office in Tokyo Monday. The […]

Not just climate but legal challenges looming

Samoa Supreme Court Justice Vui Clarence Nelson is looking ahead to a future when climate change starts to pose legal challenges, not just environmental ones. While groups of children take entire countries to task over climate change inaction, and students are turning to the International Court of Justice over climate change and human rights, here […]

Five Schools Trial Solutions to Reduce Plastics

Honiara, Solomon Islands — Five Honiara schools are trying for 10 weeks to replace single-use plastics in their lunch service through a new waste management initiative. Koloale, Florence Young and Emmaus schools are trialing a refundable-fee scheme, which involves lunch vendors or the school canteen serving lunches with reusable containers. Students are refunded a small […]

Living on the Edge of Climate Change

The sinking island of Fanalei STANDING outside his home at Fouele settlement, Fredrick Maeaba gazes across the calm waters of Port Adam passage in the southern region of Malaita. His eyes were fixed on Fanalei Island, located some four kilometres across the waters. He was once a resident on that island. But six years ago […]

Grim climate view for Pacific Islands

A RECENT research has shown the frequency of tropical cyclones (TCs) could increase by up to 40 per cent in the horseshoe-shaped region of Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Marshall Islands and Hawaii. Fiji-born Australian scientist Savin Chand, in his research — El Nino-driven tropical cyclone climate projections for the Pacific — found that a location […]