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‘Pacific Community’ name adopted

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1 February 2016, Noumea

Expect to see and hear a lot more about the Pacific Community.

This follows the decision that the ‘Secretariat of the Pacific Community’ should be known simply by its formal name, the ‘Pacific Community’.

“By adopting the ‘Pacific Community’ as our public name we’re essentially going back to the future, as this was the legal name chosen by our members back in 1997, replacing the ‘South Pacific Commission’ title,” the Pacific Community Director-General, Dr Colin Tukuitonga, said.

“Reverting to our organisation’s formal name reflects the Pacific Community’s inclusive mandate and broad Pacific region coverage, and promotes greater ownership by our 26 country and territory members, beyond the secretariat.



“The name change has coincided with the release of our Strategic Plan for 2016-2020, and is part of our sharper focus on sustainable development results, recognising that development effectiveness does indeed rely on partnerships built on shared goals and commitment,” Dr Tukuitonga said.

A refreshed Pacific Community logo has been released which retains the familiar circular element that has been part of the organisation’s logo for more than three decades.

The abbreviation ‘SPC’ is being retained given its widespread use across the Pacific Islands region.

The Pacific Community Logo Use Guidelines are available online here. All partners of the Pacific Community (SPC) are being asked to use the correct name and logo.

The logo files may be obtained by emailing This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Media contact: Lauren Robinson  Acting Media Relations Team Leader  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it    +679





 

Last Updated on Thursday, 04 February 2016 12:23  

Newsflash

Data Release Report by Joanne Robbins

Landslides pose a significant threat to life and infrastructure in Papua New Guinea (PNG), with numerous movements being recorded annually. Such events are typically instigated by the combined effects of different geomorphological control factors, such as slope or geology, and the influence of a triggering event (i.e. an earthquake or heavy rainfall). Rugged topography and high seismicity combine in PNG, to make the region highly susceptible to large-volume, earthquake-induced landslides, while the climate encourages widespread rainfall-induced landslides. Of the two triggering mechanisms, understanding rainfall-induced landslide occurrence offers the best scope for early warning/forecasting system development, as meteorological models and data availability improve.

This paper presents an overview of research conducted to understand regionally-based, rainfall-induced landslide occurrence in PNG. Given the regional focus of this research and the need to develop a cost effective and reproducible methodology, pre-existing or freely available satellite and airborne data have been used. The aim of this research was to develop models capable of identifying rainfall events with the potential to trigger landslides, as well as models that distinguish areas of heightened landslide susceptibility from those with low/no landslide susceptibility. Together, these modelling approaches can be used to generate a broad-scale early warning/forecasting system, which could help to reduce the losses associated with landslides across PNG.