Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea lies within the “Coral Triangle,” renowned for its coral reef diversity and high conservation priority. The reefs in many Coral Triangle countries nonetheless show marked degradation from overfishing and other unsustainable activities, but Papua New Guinea’s reef ecosystems are still comparatively intact and functional, despite a long history of subsistence use by coastal communities. However, growing human populations and new pressures to export wild-caught fish for the Asian market and other resources to foreign countries are placing increasing and unsustainable demands on Papua New Guinea’s marine ecosystems.

Conserving A Globally Significant Coral Reef Seascape

The New Ireland Seascape stretches through the northern arc of the Bismarck Sea, around The seascape has some of the best-developed and most diverse coral assemblages in the entire Coral Triangle. The New Ireland Seascape also is home to some of the highest fish diversities recorded to date, and is famed among scuba divers for its abundant marine life, ranging from pygmy seahorses to reef sharks. However, destructive fishing and collection practices, such as making lime for betel nut from coral, are threatening the very resources on which the people depend.

Developing Innovative Conservation Approaches

Papua New Guinea’s highly decentralized marine tenure system places most management decision-making authority at the local level, meaning that communities are owners and managers of their own marine resources.  Under the right circumstances, this arrangement can enable rapid adoption of conservation measures. A number of communities in New Ireland practice some form of reef management that is based on traditional practice. These measures are unlikely to be sufficient to combat escalating threats, but the strengthening and re-implementation of traditional regimes can provide a socially and culturally appropriate and effective tool for communities to sustainably manage their reef resources.  For example, there is a long history of temporarily closing areas to fishing, to allow stocks to replenish before a feast.  Such areas can temporarily benefit fishing, but are inadequate to conserve biodiversity over the long term.  Supplementing temporary closures with permanent ones is a promising approach that WCS is pursuing with local communities.

Training & Capacity-Building

One of the greatest threats to long-term conservation of Papua New Guinea’s coral reefs is the paucity of trained marine scientists and conservationists in the country. WCS has established and led the country’s first intensive marine training course, drawing high-level students from the University of Papua New Guinea to a month-long course covering field survey techniques, fish and coral identification, data collection and analysis, and report preparation.  The most promising students are invited to become interns with the WCS Papua New Guinea Marine Program, where they receive intensive training as field assistants and junior staff scientists at our base in Kavieng.  We are also working with the people of New Ireland, who understand that their activities affect the environment but often lack the understanding or capacity to
adequately implement conservation measures.   

Essential Research

WCS is conducting ecological and socio-economic research to understand how to conserve coral reefs effectively in a country with limited management capacity, strong cultural traditions and local resource ownership, and urgent conservation needs. We have also evaluated the effectiveness of different traditional management measures to determine how they should best be used or augmented to achieve conservation while meeting human needs.  In Manus, we are looking at ways to produce lime more sustainably with coral propagation, management reserves, harvesting and selling rules, etc.

Looking Ahead

WCS marine conservation efforts have successfully developed and implemented   a working model of clustered marine reserves that meets the needs of local communities, while living up to the important criteria of ecological function. As this implementation continues, scores of communities are requesting support for similar conservation efforts on the adjacent reefs.  In the coming years, WCS will enable these communities to replicate this approach, adapt to specific needs and expand conservation to a broadening network of reserve across the New Ireland.

Achievements

·  First intensive marine training course in Papua New Guinea held, developing the professional skills of more than 100 young marine scientists
·  Traditional management programs proven successful in conserving reefs re-established
·  Destructive fishing practices reduced
·  Factors driving successful coral reef management in Papua New Guinea identified
·  Promising young scientists trained through internships