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The Prospect - Issue 1: May 2013

Monday, 10 June 2013 17:48 administrator
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Welcome to the first newsletter from the SPC-EU Pacific Deep Sea.

The SPC-EU Pacific Deep Sea Minerals Project is helping Pacific Island countries to improve the governance and management their deep-sea minerals resources. The Project is helping the  countries to improve legal frameworks, increase technical capacity and to develop effective monitoring systems.

The Pacific Deep Sea Minerals Project is funded by the European Union and managed by SOPAC, the Applied Geoscience & Technology Division of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community, on behalf of 15 Pacific Island Countries: the Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Timor Leste, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.

The 4-year (2011-2014) SPC-EU Pacific Deep Sea Minerals Project is the first major initiative designed to regulate this new activity in a coordinated way within the Pacific Region. The  national €4.4 million governments EU-funded develop project the is designed legal, fiscal to help and environment management frameworks needed to ensure that any exploitation of deep sea minerals will directly support national economic development while also minimizing any negative impacts on the environment and local communities.

In This Issue:

  • Tonga Workshop Builds Vital Contract Negotiation Skills
  • SPC Director, Dr Jimmie Rodgers talks Deep Sea Minerals
  • Tonga Workshop Highlights Need for Greater Integration between Government & Civil Society Organisations
  • Staff Profile: Akuila Tawake
  • Project Highlights
  • Upcoming Events

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Last Updated on Wednesday, 19 June 2013 15:15  

Newsflash

Friday 9 May 2014, Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) Suva, Fiji - Deep sea minerals have the potential to be a game changer for the Pacific. Whether they will bring a change for the good or the bad will be determined by the financial management of governments and their ability to adopt and enforce sensible environmental safeguards.

If revenue is managed transparently and prudently while protecting the environment, deep sea minerals could greatly improve the economies and livelihoods of the Pacific Islands countries.

To address these issues, the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) is holding a regional workshop, the fifth in its technical training series. This workshop will be held in Cook Islands on 13–16 May and will centre on the ‘Financial Aspects’ of the upcoming deep sea minerals industry.

The workshop will bring together more than 60 Pacific Island government minerals and finance officials and experts from around the globe for the first regional event of its kind on managing the potential wealth generated from the extraction of deep sea minerals. Although deep sea mining is yet to occur world-wide, there is much commercial interest in mineral formations, such as nodules, crusts and seafloor massive sulphides that have been discovered on the seabed, thousands of metres below sea-level, particularly in the Pacific Ocean.