Youth-Led Landmark Climate Change Case Starts in The Hague

The intersection of law, diplomacy, and science will come under the spotlight at the International Court of Justice hearings starting today (Monday, December 2, 2024) in The Hague as the court starts its deliberations into the obligations under international law of UN member states to protect people and ecosystems from climate change.

Pacific Community Photographic Winners Bring Impacts of Climate Change to Life

The Pacific Community’s photographic competition winners reflect the devastating climate impacts on beautiful and sensitive environments, documenting the most pressing issues the communities who live on the islands face today.

Pioneering Digital Initiative Empowers Pacific Islands to Tackle Climate Disasters

Winning a battle for survival requires understanding the opponent. And, for the peoples of 22 island nations and territories scattered across more than 155 million square kilometres of Pacific Ocean, the volatility and wrath of the climate are their greatest threats.

Pacific Leaders Announce Largest Conservation Effort in History

Pacific people live at the nexus of oceans, climate, and food systems, and the interaction of climate and ocean is raising sea temperatures and threatening habitats and resources vital to the region’s sustenance, Palau’s President Surangel Whipps, Jr., said at the launch of an effort to protect and rejuvenate the region's ecosystems and empower communities through to the year 2050—in what is considered to be the biggest single conservation effort in history—Unlocking Blue Pacific Prosperity.

Climate Disasters Have Major Consequences for Informal Economies

In the Pacific Islands and many developing and emerging countries worldwide, the informal economy far outsizes the formal one, playing a vital role in the survival of urban and rural households and absorbing expanding working-age populations.

Biodiversity Rich-Palau Launches Ambitious Marine Spatial Planning Initiative

Growing up in Palau in the western Pacific Ocean, Surangel Whipps Jr. played on the reefs and spearfished on an island teeming with birds, giant clams, fish, and turtles.

Pacific Island Countries To Develop Advanced Warning System for Tuna Migration

Climate change and warming ocean waters are causing tuna fisheries to migrate to international waters, away from a country’s jurisdiction, thereby putting the food and economic security of many Pacific Island countries and territories at risk.

Food Shortages Deepen in Cyclone-Devastated Vanuatu

One month after the Pacific Island nation of Vanuatu was hit by two Category 4 cyclones within three days, food scarcity and prices are rising in the country following widespread devastation of the agriculture sector.

Food Systems Crucial for Pacific Islands at COP27

Food is everything to the culture and identity of the Pacific island countries. Climate change impacts of rising sea levels and higher temperatures threaten islanders’ food security, which is largely dependent on fisheries and subsistence agriculture. Almost 70 percent of islanders rely on agriculture for their livelihood.

Climate Change is No ‘Future Scenario’ for Pacific Island Nations; Climate Change is ‘Real’

Pacific island countries are highly vulnerable to climate change, and several have disappeared – and more could sink under the sea owing to a rise in water levels.

COP27: Cyclone Nearly Washed Away All My Dreams, says Vanuatu Youth Activist

The only thing Taren Chilia remembers about Cyclone Pam was that it flattened his school in Vanuatu, washing away books, equipment, and – well, almost his dreams too.

Pacific Community’s Agricultural Gene Bank Wins Global Award

Safeguarding plentiful, nutritious supplies of food for the present generation of Pacific Islanders and those who come in the future is a frontline goal in the wake of the pandemic and the continual threat of climate extremes to island farming. But the region, where 50 to 70 percent of people depend on agriculture and fisheries for sustenance and income, is now one step ahead in that objective. The region’s agricultural gene bank, established by the development organisation, Pacific Community (SPC), is now acclaimed as world-class and a leader in building future food supplies.