The end of the Pacific? Effects of sea level rise on Pacific Island livelihoods

As in the past, most Pacific Island people live today along island coasts and subsist largely on foods available both onshore and offshore. On at least two occasions in the 3500 years that Pacific Islands have been settled, sea level changes affected coastal bioproductivity to the extent that island societies were transformed in consequence. Over the past 200 years, sea level has been rising along most Pacific Island coasts causing loss of productive land through direct inundation (flooding), shoreline erosion and groundwater salinization. Responses have been largely uninformed, many unsuccessful. By the year 2100, sea level may be 1.2 m higher than today. Together with other climate‐linked changes and unsustainable human pressures on coastal zones, this will pose huge challenges for livelihoods. There is an urgent need for effective and sustainable adaptation of livelihoods to prepare for future sea level rise in the Pacific Islands region. There are also lessons to be learned from past failures, including the need for adaptive solutions that are environmentally and culturally appropriate, and those which appropriate decision makers are empowered to design and implement. Around the middle of the twenty‐first century, traditional coastal livelihoods are likely to be difficult to sustain, so people in the region will need alternative food production systems. Within the next 20–30 years, it is likely that many coastal settlements will need to be relocated, partly or wholly. There are advantages in anticipating these needs and planning for them sooner rather than later. In many ways, the historical and modern Pacific will end within the next few decades. There will be fundamental irreversible changes in island geography, settlement patterns, subsistence systems, societies and economic development, forced by sea level rise and other factors.     

THE A.D. 1300 EVENT IN THE PACIFIC BASIN*

ABSTRACT. Around a.d. 1300 the entire Pacific Basin (continental Pacific Rim and oceanic Pacific Islands) was affected by comparatively rapid cooling and sea‐level fall, and possibly increased storminess, that caused massive and enduring changes to Pacific environments and societies. For most Pacific societies, adapted to the warmer, drier, and more stable climates of the preceding Medieval Climate Anomaly (a.d. 750–1250), the effects of this A.D. 1300 Event were profoundly disruptive, largely because of the reduction in food resources available in coastal zones attributable to the 70–80‐centimeter sea‐level fall. This disruption was manifested by the outbreak of persistent conflict, shifts in settlements from coasts to refugia inland or on unoccupied offshore islands, changes in subsistence strategies, and an abrupt end to long‐distance cross‐ocean interaction during the ensuing Little Ice Age (a.d. 1350–1800). The A.D. 1300 Event provides a good example of the disruptive potential for human societies of abrupt, short‐lived climate changes.     

Illuminating Sea-Level Fall around AD 1220–1510 (730-440 cal yr BP) in the Pacific Islands: Implications for Environmental Change and Cultural Transformation

This paper focuses on the climatic transition between the Little Climatic Optimum (approximately AD 750–1300 or 1200‐650 cal yr BP) and the Little Ice Age (approximately AD 1300–1800 or 650‐150 cal yr BP) in the Pacific Islands. This transition was marked by rapid temperature and sea‐level fall, and perhaps by sharply‐increased precipitation associated with an increase in El Nino frequency. Examples from throughout the Pacific Islands demonstrate the possible and/or likely effects of sea‐level fall at this time on inland horticulture through water‐table fall; on coral reefs and lagoons through the emergence of reef surfaces and the consequent reduction of nearshore water circulation; on the emergence of reef islets and the conversion of tidal inlets to brackish lakes. The effects of such changes on human lifestyles are explored.     

经济形态演变对海洋海岛生态环境的影响——以美国海峡群岛为例

海洋海岛生态环境脆弱,一旦遭受破坏难以修复。人类社会历经原始经济时代、农业经济时代、工业经济时代和知识经济时代,经济形态的演变影响着人类生存的生态环境。以美国海峡群岛为例,以时间和事件两个维度对海岛生态环境破坏、生态修复和环境保护进行梳理,侧重于知识经济时代在国家公园管理局管理下的生态修复和环境保护。其中信息知识、生态文明、高新技术是海峡群岛实现生态回归的重要因素。海峡群岛的发展历程和后期的生态修复与管理为其他国家海洋海岛经济发展提供借鉴。     

Women, Disempowerment and Resistance: An Analysis of Logging and Mining Activities in the Pacific

There are many arguments supporting the need for a reduction of large scale logging and mining activities in Pacific Island countries. In addition to ecological and economic concerns, logging and mining have had significant social impacts, including gendered impacts. Women tend to be excluded from decision-making processes, and they have limited access to royalty payments and business and employment opportunities which emerge. Women also bear a disproportionate share of the responsibility for dealing with the social and environmental mess which accumulates. However, women are not simply passive victims of logging and mining activities, as this discussion of the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea will argue. They are often the first to feel dissatisfaction with logging and mining and it is such dissatisfaction which has fuelled civil unrest, from family break-ups to sabotage of machinery to civil war, in some communities. It may thus be useful for companies to more carefully monitor the effects of their activities on women and involve women more actively in decision-making bodies if they wish to avoid such unrest in the future.     

SEA PEOPLE OF THE WEST*

ABSTRACT. Two thousand years ago, or thereabouts, a double canoe sailed on a northeast tack (or maybe a southeast tack) from a Homeland (Hawaiki) among the islands of Samoa, Tonga, and Fiji. After a voyage of 7,000 kilometers, which bypassed the many as yet uninhabited islands of the central Pacific (such as Tahiti) and the stretch of the seventy atolls of the Tuamotu that spread umbrellalike across the eastern entry of the Pacific, the canoe landed on islands that the Spaniards in 1595 were to call “the Marquesas.” The descendants of these first settlers call their islands “Fenua'enata” (Land of the People). Here I tell the story of this first beach crossing after what I consider to be the most remarkable voyage of discovery and settlement in all of human history. These first settlers (shall we say a dozen adults?) brought the animals and food plants that would make their island inhabitable. More mysteriously, these voyagers were—in body, mind, and spirit—all that we have come to call “Polynesian” in the great triangle of Hawai'i, Aotearoa (New Zealand), and Rapa Nui (Easter Island). “Sea of Islands” is the name the descendants of this first voyage prefer to call that great triangle. I here celebrate a Sea People's mastery of their Sea of Islands.     

流域水环境遥感研究进展与思考

卫星遥感作为一种先进的水环境监测技术手段,可以监测现状,掌握现有情况;也可以追溯过去,揭示变化规律;同时还可以结合动力模型,模拟未来。这为人类了解、掌握和管理流域水环境变化发挥不可替代的作用。特别是近10 a已经进入“高分卫星时代”,卫星传感器的空间分辨率越来越高,可观测的参数越来越多,反演和估算精度越来越高。但是,目前还缺乏从流域角度阐述水环境遥感的相关综述文章。论文围绕“流域水环境遥感”研究主题,明确了研究的对象和范围,厘清了基本理论框架,并结合大家关注的问题,包括卫星数据源、水环境模型、富营养化湖泊藻类富集、水生植被退化、水面积变化等方面的研究进展和存在的问题进行了回顾和梳理;并指出在全球变暖和人类活动加剧背景下,未来需要研发专门面向流域水环境的天-空-地立体观测体系和系统框架,开展全流域统筹的水环境遥感监测和模拟,同时加强流域水体碳循环遥感研究。     

1986年冬季中国南极长城站的地震观测

1986年3月30日至12月25日为期271天的冬季地震观测中,中国南极长城站地震台共记录到各种震动3000余次,其中大部分为长城湾冰层破裂产生的微震,4次为南设得兰群岛邻近海域中的浅源地震以及5月7日阿留申群岛发生的8.1级地震和4月14日南桑韦奇群岛发生的6.4级地震。冰震与构造地震具有明显的差异。1986年11月16日的地震记录为分析冰震与构造地震的区别提供了很好的例证。冰震具有初动尖锐、频率高和衰减快的特征。根据初动和波型很容易将冰震与构造地震区分开。     

New insight into the crust and upper mantle structure under Alaska

To better understand the seismic structure of the subducting Pacific plate under Alaska, we determined the three-dimensional P-wave velocity structure to a depth of approximately 200 km beneath Alaska using 438,146 P-wave arrival times from 10,900 earthquakes. In this study an irregular grid parameterization was adopted to express the velocity structure under Alaska. The number of grid nodes increases from north to south in the study area so that the spacing between grid nodes is approximately the same in the longitude direction. Our results suggest that the subducting Pacific slab under Alaska can be divided into three different parts based on its geometry and velocity structure. The western part has features similar to those in other subduction zones. In the central part a thick low-velocity zone is imaged at the top of the subducting Pacific slab beneath north of the Kenai Peninsula, which is believed to be most likely the oceanic crust plus an overlying serpentinized zone and the coupled Yakutat terrane subducted with the Pacific slab. In the eastern part, significant high-velocity anomalies are visible to 60–90 km depth, suggesting that the Pacific slab has only subducted down to that depth.     

S to P scattering at the 650 km discontinuity

Summary. A search of seismograms recorded at the Warramunga seismic array (WRA) from events occurring below the Izu-Bonin Islands shows an arrival on some, but not all, of the records, with an onset at 25–30 s after P , which is not predicted by the standard travel-time tables. The slowness and azimuth of the phase show that it is generated almost in line with P , and the variation of arrival time with the hypocentral depth of the earthquake indicates that its origin lies on the receiver side of the source. It appears, in fact, to be an S to P conversion at a depth of 650–700 km, which is seen only when the receiver is close to a node of the P radiation pattern and an antinode for S so that its amplitude compared with that of P is at a maximum.
Finally, the duration of the phase indicates that it is not simply a refracted wave, but that it has a coda of scattered arrivals from lateral heterogeneity in the neighbourhood of 650 km below the Izu-Bonin Islands.     

关于琉球群岛人类起源的研究综述

琉球群岛何时开始出现人类?琉球人来自哪里?琉球民族是一个独立的民族还是大和民族的一个分支?这些关于琉球民族本质的问题目前学术上尚存争论。运用文献分析法和综合分析法,对考古学、文化人类学和群体遗传学的研究成果进行系统整理和分析评价。在此基础上,对琉球群岛人类种群的起源、迁移以及琉球人与东亚地区其他民族之间的亲缘关系进行讨论。考古学研究发现,在旧石器时代琉球群岛已有人类活动的痕迹。群体遗传学关于人类线粒体DNA与Y染色体解析以及基因组比较研究证明,起源于非洲的古人类,大约在新生代第四纪更新世晚期迁移至东南亚地区,之后逐渐扩散至日本列岛和琉球群岛成为现代日本人和琉球人的祖先。琉球人与日本人的亲缘关系密切,都保留着阿伊努人的生物学遗传特征。考古学发现和文化人类学对于文化相近性的分析显示,冲绳诸岛以北的北琉球文化与日本的绳文文化亲缘关系密切,先岛诸岛的南琉球文化与南岛系文化更为接近。此外,14世纪以后在琉球王国与东亚各国的贸易交流过程中,来自中国大陆、朝鲜半岛和东南亚地区的一些文化要素也渗透到传统的琉球文化之中。     

In Pursuit of Moving Targets: New Zealand Population Geography in the South Pacific

New Zealand population geographers in the South Pacific islands early focused on resource issues, especially in Fiji and the smaller island states politically linked to New Zealand. This later extended into analysis of the structure of village level economic and social development, notably in Kiribati, Solomon Islands and Fiji. These analyses contributed to a clearer understanding of the substance of development at a key turning point in the region's history - the transition to independence. Migration, or mobility, and urbanisation attracted enormous interest throughout the region, with lengthy debates ranging over migration models, urban permanence, the ideology of return and metaphors of mobility, establishing the most distinctive thrust of New Zealand research in the region. Practical research, involving censuses and consultancies, has directly contributed to development. Despite the valuable historical legacy the extent and significance of New Zealand work on the population geography of the Island Pacific has now dwindled.     

Coastal Changes Over the Past 200 Years Around Ovalau and Moturiki Islands,Fiji: Implications for coastal zone management

The islands Ovalau and Moturiki in central Fiji are selected for the investigation of coastal change over the past c. 200 years. Although having coastal environments typical of many tropical Pacific Islands, Ovalau and Moturiki are also atypical because they experienced urban and infrastructural developments before most other parts. The associated records enable recent coastal changes to be discerned more clearly here than has been possible elsewhere. The islands are surrounded by coral reef, the configuration of which accounts for variations in vulnerability of their coasts to erosion. Interviews were conducted in each of 22 settlements along the islands' coasts and information obtained about recent coastal change. Mangroves are concentrated along leeward coasts, although they have been cleared from many windward coasts in the last 40 + years, causing shoreline erosion to be initiated/accelerated. Most shoreline-protection initiatives (vegetation planting and seawall construction) have failed. Three major management implications of the study are discussed. Firstly, there is a need to redefine the nature of the interactions between coastal inhabitants and coastal ecosystems, so that environments are sustainably developed; and specifically that reefs are conserved and shoreline vegetation (especially mangroves) is effectively replanted. Secondly, information about appropriate design and composition of artificial structures for shoreline protection needs to be made available to the local communities who construct most of them. Thirdly, alternative sources of sand and rock aggregate to those whose extraction aggravates shoreline erosion should be sought.     

Neoliberal Globalisation, "Exotic" Agro-exports, and Local Change in the Pacific Islands: A Study of the Fijian Kava Sector

The economically vulnerable and geographically isolated states and territories of the Pacific Islands find themselves increasingly powerless to resist the recent accelerated diffusion of globalisation and the economic options that this entails. Neoliberal policy has arrived in the ocean region later than elsewhere in the tropical world and in the developing world in general. However, it now almost exclusively frames regional and state policy agendas, and is profoundly restructuring economies and societies across the region. Agriculture, by far the leading economic sector in Pacific Island countries, has been targeted specifically for reform. The cultivation of non-traditional agricultural exports has formed the centrepiece of the evolving strategy. As well as "staple" exports such as sugar, copra, and taro going to non-traditional markets, "exotic" niche products are being developed for export to high income markets in Europe, Asia and North America. A major example of such a product is kava – a "traditional" crop used in the preparation of a ceremonial and/or social drink. Psycho- and physiological properties have been identified in the plant by the pharmaceutical industry that is marketing a range of kava products. Produced widely across the Pacific, Fiji is the major export source. This paper traces the evolution of globalisation in the Pacific Islands, placing the current wave of neoliberalism in its historical context. It goes on to outline the evolution of the Fijian kava export sector, and investigates some of the local socio-economic impacts of recent market growth. Given the evidence presented in this study, the paper asks if the power relations evolving under contemporary neoliberal globalisation are likely to be any different from those that existed during colonial globalisation.     

Investigating education,migration and development – Moving triangles in the Pacific

Is it possible that education in the Global South leads to emigration and is therefore detrimental to development prospects? For the Pacific Islands region, this issue is particularly pertinent, given the high rates of migration and the strong emphasis placed on education as a basis for development. Although our knowledge of the bilateral relations between, respectively, education and development, education and migration, and migration and development have advanced, we know very little of the complex interplay between the three. In this article, we suggest a new approach to the trilateral relationship among education, migration and development in the Pacific Islands which may have implications beyond that region.     

How many seasonal workers from the Pacific have been employed in New Zealand since the RSE scheme began?

This Research Note provides the first reliable figures on the numbers of seasonal workers from the Pacific Islands who participated in the Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) scheme between July 2007 and June 2022. The method for deriving these figures is explained briefly before examining the frequency of return by men and women for employment in subsequent seasons from the nine participating Pacific states. Clarification of the numbers of seasonal workers involved in the scheme, as distinct from work visas issued each year for RSE employment, is timely for two reasons. Firstly, the RSE scheme is under review in March 2023 by Immigration New Zealand. Secondly, the three major sources of Pacific seasonal labour are raising questions in 2023 about the impact of the scheme on their domestic labour markets and economies. Robust data on numbers of Pacific seasonal workers during the scheme's first 15 years contributes important information in both these contexts.     

ANTHROPOGENIC CHANGE IN THE LANDSCAPES OF HIGHLAND ECUADOR*

ABSTRACT. The anthropogenic nature of Andean ecosystems is discussed in the framework of tree‐line dynamics in selected sites in Ecuador. Indicators of human impact are evidence of the need for a scientific understanding of neotropical mountains that is better in tune with the special conditions of tropical Andean environments. Tropandean systems are neither tropical ecosystems nor midlatitude regions, and lessons from ecologically damaging activities in those ecosystems cannot be transferred readily to Tropandean systems. Better research from the ethnobiological and ecological fronts is needed if we are to comprehend the intricate functions of neotropical mountains, particularly the cloud‐forest belt, which is regarded as the most threatened ecosystem when considering sustainability scenarios.     

青海湖地区人类活动对生态环境影响及其保护对策

本文根据作者近年来对青海湖地区人类活动和环境现状的调查，探讨了该区人类活动和环境和现状的调查，探讨了该区人类活动和生态环境的关系及特点，分析了人为活动对生态与环境影响的空间、时间及动态特征；并针对该区目前的环境状况提供出保护对策。     

西溪国家湿地公园模式的实践与探索

作为首个国家湿地公园,杭州西溪国家湿地公园全力探索“西溪模式”,寻求科学保护与适度利用之间的平衡点,努力走出一条保护与利用的“双赢”之路。在建设西溪国家湿地公园的过程中,主要抓住“规划、保护、管理、研究”4个环节建设好西溪湿地天堂。坚持规划先行,构筑区域性人与自然和谐发展的规划体系;实施科学保护,调整并规划区内人类活动的强度与容量;注重精心管理,实现湿地生态环境、生态资源的科学保护和合理利用;做好深入研究,努力为湿地保护利用提供决策依据和理论指导。     

ROOST SITES AND COMMUNAL BEHAVIOR OF ANDEAN CONDORS IN CHILE*

The Andean condor (Vultur gryphus) is an endangered species. Even southern Patagonia, home to the most stable and abundant populations of Andean condors, is witnessing increasing pressure from development and tourism. Taking the case of Torres del Paine National Park, in the Chilean Patagonia, we examine monitoring of condor populations at roosting sites and communal bird behavior in response to humans as an effective tool for bird conservation within protected areas. Based on field data collected throughout 2007, we identify new roosting places, explore activity patterns and population characteristics of free‐ranging and roosting Andean condors, examine bird behavior in response to humans, and analyze the current and likely future ecological impacts of tourism on the condor population and its habitat. Our results reveal that the impact of tourism is still low and that the Andean condors do not seem to be declining in numbers in the park but that the importance of roosts and animal behavior in response to humans must be considered for future monitoring, bird‐conservation planning, and ecotourism management.