NEWSPAGE 12 January
2011

(Photo: Photosport)

NEW ZEALAND: Valerie Adams - Destination Christchurch

SAMOA: Samoa names powerful side
Source: Fiji Times

Samoa has named a powerful side to compete in the 2011 Uprising Fiji International Sevens in Suva this month.

IRB Sevens Player of the Year Mikaele Pesamino will be one of the key players in the team that will be known as the Samoa Barbarians during the tournament.

Uprising Sevens organiser Randal Kamea said while the side would be called the Samoa Barbarians, it was basically the Samoa side that had been playing in the IRB series.

Apart from the flying wing Pesamino, the Samoa Barbarians side will also have hard working Alafoti Faosiliva, Alatasi Tupou, Apelu Faaiuga, Fautua Otto, Paul Chan Tung, Taulagi Afamasaga and Paul Perez.

"The side will miss the services of Lolo Lui and two others due to injury," Kamea said.

"But this is the best they can put together this time and they will be coming to win the tournament."

Samoa's participation in the two-day inaugural Uprising tournament will give them a wonderful chance to have a hit out before they take part in the Wellington Sevens early next month.

The Fiji team will also take part along with Tonga.

The Uprising Fiji Sevens Tournament will be held on January 21-22 at the tfl National Stadium. Samoa, Fiji and Tonga will use the tournament as a warm-up before travelling to New Zealand to play in the Wellington Sevens.

The Samoa Barbarians team: Alafoti Faosiliva, Apelu Faaiuga, Falemiga Selesele, Levi Asi, Taulagi Afamasaga, Paul Chan Tung, Alatasi Tupou, Fautua Otto, Mikaele Pesamino, Paul Perez, Sani Niue, Robert Lilomaiava.
 

(Photo: Andrew Fanasia Jr.)

AUSTRALIA: Fijian FM appreciates Australia's scholarship upscale
Source: Xinhua

Fiji's Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Ratu Inoke Kubuabola has expressed his appreciation for Australia's decision to increase the number of scholarship to Fiji.

Australia has recently decided to increase its scholarships to Fiji from 20 to 40 awards (24 postgraduate and 16 undergraduate) for the 2011 intake.

Fijian Information Ministry's press release quoted Kubuabola as saying that "I am therefore pleased with the Australian Government 's decision to upscale its scholarship award to Fiji because this will help us overcome some of our impediments to higher education and improve education and training opportunities for our people."

"I am hopeful, however that Australia can further increase the number of awards in the next five years given their acknowledgment, that the latest increase is due to the high success rate amongst our candidates and their contributions on their return to Fiji and the high demand and quality of our candidates," said the foreign minister.

According to the Information Ministry's press release, in 2009 there were 27 Fijian recipients of Australian Regional Development Scholarships, who graduated with qualifications in health, agriculture, engineering, environment, business and governance.

Last year, a further 10 Fijian recipients of Australian Development Scholarships (ADS) attained qualifications in health, governance, engineering and agriculture, according to the Information Ministry's press release

During 2005-2009 Fijian scholarship recipients had a 96 percent academic success rate, and a 2008 study showed that ADS alumni were broadly contributing to economic growth, with 85 percent of respondents employed -- the majority in our public service.

Kubuabola expressed his hope that "Australia can further increase scholarship awards for Fiji in the next five years."

Photo Caption: Fijian Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Ratu Inoke Kubuabola.
 

(Photo: Pacific Scoop)

NEW CALEDONIA: President Sarkozy to visit New Caledonia for Pacific Games
Source: Pacific Scoop

French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s office has announced a Presidential visit to New Caledonia late July 2011 for the official opening of the South Pacific Games, this year being hosted in the French Pacific territory.

The visit would be the first to the Pacific for the French head of state, whose office had earlier announced similar trips that did not eventuate.

The 2011 Pacific Games will be officially opened in New Caledonia in late August.

Earlier announcements of a presidential visit to New Caledonia included one on the occasion of the last France-Oceania meeting, that took place in late July 2009 in Nouméa.

The two former such France-Oceania summits took place in 2003 in Pape’ete (French Polynesia) and Paris.

They were both chaired by then French President Jacques Chirac.


‘Associate’ status

As a result of what has been perceived as a restoration of strong ties between France, its Pacific territories and the Pacific Islands Forum member States, New Caledonia and French Polynesia were in 2005 granted the new “associate member” status within the regional organisation.

Wallis and Futuna, the third French Pacific territory, became an observer.

The visit was also planned to include a stopover in Australia, but it was finally then Foreign Affairs minister Bernard Kouchner who had to step in and chair the meeting.

This year, Sarkozy’s entourage during his visit to the Pacific could also include French associate minister in charge of Overseas, Marie-Luce Penchard.

The French government has also officially labelled 2011 the Year of French Overseas departments and territories.

In July 2010, French Prime minister François Fillon paid a visit to New Caledonia where he witnessed for the first time the hoisting of both the French national flag and a “local” flag, that of the pro-independence movement FLNKS (Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front) as part of steps for New Caledonia to move towards its own
identity, as set out in the autonomy Nouméa Accord signed in 1998 between pro-independence, pro-French parties and the French government.

The Pacific Games, this year, to be held between August 28 and September 12, 2010, would be the first opportunity for this dual flag system to be implemented during an international event.


Dual flag system

During a recent follow-up committee meeting of the Nouméa Accord, in June 2010, the notion of the dual flag system was described as being in line with “the spirit of the historic handshake between Jacques Lafleur and Jean-Marie Tjibaou” (in 1988) and it was therefore recommended that “the tricolour (French) flag and that of the FLNKS should be hoisted
side by side in New Caledonia”.

Following grave civil unrest related to the independence issue in the first half of the 1980s, pro-French leader Jacques Lafleur and pro-independence leader Jean-Marie Tjibaou signed a first political agreement, the Matignon-Oudinot Accord, in 1988.

In 1989 Tjibaou was murdered by a hardliner within his own pro-independence camp (Lafleur died on 4 December 2010).

Ten years later, the Nouméa Accord was signed and provides a de facto roadmap for New Caledonia’s increased autonomy, with on the agenda a
gradual transfer of powers from metropolitan France to local institutions, a “re-balancing” of economic wealth and opportunities between the affluent South and the less favoured Northern part of the island territory and a possible referendum on self-determination between 2014 and 2018.

Photo Caption: Dual flags: The French Tricolore and the Kanak independence flag.
 

(Photo: Guam Department of Agriculture)

USA: Indigenous Guam fishermen risk of drowning more than doubled
Source: Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council Press Release

For fishermen on Guam who have traditionally fished inshore, a major concern is the loss of accessible fishing grounds caused in part by the establishment of five marine preserve areas (MPAs) in 1997. Fishermen have reported that the MPAs have displaced them from traditional fishing grounds, prevent them from teaching fishing techniques in a safe environment to the younger generation and impact the future of their local culture. Now a report released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), provides concrete evidence on how dangerous fishing has become for the indigenous Chamorro fishermen since fishing restrictions in the MPAs at Tumon Bay, Piti Bomb Holes, Sasa Bay, Achang Reef Flat and Pati Point have been enforced.

“The major finding of the study was that, for Chamorro fishermen, the risk of drowning more than doubled after MPAs were enforced in 2001,” note authors Devin L. Lucas, and Jennifer M. Lincoln, PhD. On the other hand, non-Chamorro fishermen experienced a sharp decrease in the risk of drowning after MPAs were established.

The NIOSH report “The Impact of Marine Preserve Areas on the Safety of Fishermen on Guam” also found that the proportion of drowning deaths to Chamorro fishermen that occurred on the East Coast (in more hazardous waters) increased from 20 percent during 1986-2000 to 63 percent during 2001-2009.

The report concludes: “Before the MPAs were established, Guam residents fished primarily in the protected areas of the Western (leeward side) and Southern Coasts. Non-Chamorro fishermen were predominately recreational users, while Chamorro fishermen were more likely to subsist on the resource. As MPAs were established and enforced, the traditional and popular fishing grounds on the West Coast and Southern tip of the island were restricted. Non-Chamorro recreational fishermen most likely scaled back their fishing activities since few accessible, safe areas remained open. At the same time, Chamorro subsistence fishermen began fishing more heavily on the East Coast (windward side of the island). … That increased exposure to more hazardous conditions resulted in higher risk of drowning.”

For a copy of the report, which was prepared by the NIOSH for the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council, please go to www.wpcouncil.org/news. For more on Guam’s MPAs, go to http://www.guamdawr.org/aquatics/mpa.

The Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council was created by Congress in 1976 and is authorized by the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act to manage fisheries in federal waters surrounding Guam, Hawaii, American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and the US Pacific remote island areas.

Photo Caption: Throw net fisherman, Ipao beach, Tumon Bay, Marine Preserve, Guam.
 

(Photo: Vanuatu Daily Post)

VANUATU: Defining the ‘Happiest Country’
Source: Vanuatu Daily Post

Vanuatu has been internationally recognized as the Happiest Country in the World - because of being able to grow most of its own food, construct its family houses and collect household water, and all free of charge.

But there are other important aspects. People here work well together, assisting in food cultivation, house building and water reticulation, because Melanesian society is family and community-oriented.

And the one-ness of this society is such that each grouping has its own culture and often own language.

This is quite rare in the second decade of the 21st Century. And life is good, and probably a whole lot better for those who often enough go to the garden rather than the factory or office. Life would seem rather bleak for those in China who walk or run to factory work every day, breathing the diesel fumes of choked alleyways, only to produce a required number of thousands of plastic Barbie dolls in a long, dull working day. And those going to the yam garden can often take a spell by diving into the saltwater to try and catch a little protein for supper. And have fun, too. And a sleep on a hot day.

Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has been one of the most used means of defining how well off a country is. China has been way up there, and Vanuatu very much near the bottom of the list.

This is where the Happiest Country index comes in. And indices are trying to find a way of qualifying and quantifying - with an index to well being - the manifold benefits available to Melanesians, for Vanuatu and the whole region.

This is being spearheaded this week in Whakatane, New Zealand with the help of Minister for Ni-Vanuatu Business, Ralph Regenvanu, on behalf of the Malvatumauri, the Vanuatu National Cultural Council, the Vanuatu National Statistics Office, the Christensen Fund, the MSG Secretariat and the SPC.

Minister Regenvanu will be presenting the meeting with information about the new initiative currently being implemented by the National Statistics Office to develop “alternative indicators of well-being” for the Melanesian context.

Regenvanu’s traveling to the meeting is being sponsored by non-Vanuatu government sources and his trip does not represent any expense to the Vanuatu Government.

Organisers of the “Sharing Power” meeting say:
“The almost universal use of GDP-based indicators to measure progress has helped justify policies based on rapid material progress at the expense of more holistic criterion.

“Because it is a crude measure of only the cash value of activities or production, GDP is heavily biased towards increased production and consumption regardless of the necessity or desirability of such outputs.

“Policies developed with regard only to increasing per-capita GDP can have negative, and potentially disastrous, impacts on other factors contributing to life quality.”

Western, home-schooled economists will remember the efforts of the 20th Century planners which went in to trying to put a value on the work of that newly emerged creature back then, the housewife: she who would cook and sew and clean for no payment while daddy was out “making money”. Well, a similar revision process is being undertaken and hoping to go much further with the present initiative for Melanesia to statistically record indicators which will help future planners and make an impression on assistance partners. Measures for evaluating well being are a new concept, and they ratchet up the whole process of scientific evaluation of the worth of a society.

“In 2006, the UK-based New Economics Foundation published “The HappyPlanet Index: An index of human well-being and environmental impact” in which countries were ranked in relation to three indicators of well-being: life satisfaction, life expectancy, and ecological footprint. These three indicators were chosen by the Foundation to represent the ecological efficiency of delivering human well-being withinthe constraints of equitable and responsible resource consumption. The reportdeclared Vanuatu to be the “happiest country in the world.”

The “Happiest Country” title for Vanuatu has already significantly assisted the tourism industry here. Vanuatu won the title in 2006 and have got it back again after losing it for a year.

“Alternative Indicators for Well Being” got underway in Vanuatu back in 2010 with a meeting which was held here. The New Zealand discussions will take the project further and minister Regenvanu will deliver a paper on what has been achieved here recently.

He is ideally placed to do so because of his long-time leadership in the field of cultural heritage and cultural policy, not only in Vanuatu but in the region, and with his familiarity with the many cultures of Vanuatu.

His recognition of the importance of the best qualities of life in Vanuatu will be invaluable.

The “Sharing Power” Whakatane Conference brings together scientists, economists, indigenous leaders, environmentalists, academics, policy makers in national governments and international agencies, and many others who care about the quality of heritage this generation passes on to future generations.
The Conference also focuses on the need for policy and decision makers in Governments and Corporations to accommodate a greater level of inclusion of indigenous peoples and all citizens, in national and international policies on the management and governance of bio-cultural resources, and advocates the rights of mother earth.