As environmental concerns heat up amid growing interest in minerals exploration and mining of the Pacific ocean’s seabed, one scientist is advocating the search for more inactive hydrothermal vents as a way of safely mining the sea.
Dr Sven Peterson, a minerologist at the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences (IFM-GEOMAR) in Germany, said inactive vents were less likely to host marine life, so mining them would pose lesser danger to the ocean’s ecosystems.
“At water depths of 500 to 5000 metres which the mining industry will be interested in, there is no light but we still see oases of life there. This, of course, is of concern among biologists who do not want mining to happen at these oases in the deep.
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Two hundred delegates from 22 island countries and territories in the Pacific region met with experts from around the world at the 3rd Session Pacific Platform for Disaster Management to examine “a way forward” to reduce the risks of disasters including the impacts of climate change that are affecting development in the Pacific Region.
Dr Russell Howorth, Director of the Suva-based Applied Geoscience and Technology Division (SOPAC) of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) has been appointed to the Legal and Technical Commission of the International Seabed Authority (ISA).
Dr. Russell Howorth told delegates that to reduce risk and vulnerability from disasters confronting Pacific Island countries and territories, a number of important issues must be addressed “in an integrated manner at a national level and supported by regional and international partners.”
The risk of dying in a flood or tropical cyclone in the Pacific region is today only a third of what it was in 1990 says a United Nations report titled Revealing Risk, Redefining Development. This 2011 edition of the Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction (GAR11) will be launched in Auckland (New Zealand) on 3 August at the Third Session of the Pacific Platform for Disaster Risk Management.Newsflash
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Honiara, Solomon Islands – In Honiara last week, the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) led training to develop 21 new Emergency Response Team trainers for the Solomon Islands. The participants engaged in eight days of training on the various activities Emergency Response Teams are expected to perform and also learnt how to provide this training to other personnel in their respective Provinces or organisations. The training reflects collaboration at the local, regional and national levels with SPC and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), working together to prepare the training materials, which were reviewed by the Solomon Islands Red Cross Society (SIRCS) and National Disaster Management Office (NDMO) before being delivered to participants representing Red Cross and Solomon Islands Government at the provincial level, as well as NGOs such as Oxfam, Save the Children and World Vision. Following the training, participants will receive support from Red Cross and the NDMO to provide multi-agency Emergency Response Team training in their home provinces. In opening the training, the Secretary-General of Solomon Islands Red Cross, Joanne Zoleveke, and the Director of the NDMO, Loti Yates, challenged participants to take the opportunity afforded by this training to strengthen relationships between partners and to prepare to co-deliver Emergency Response Team (ERT) training at a provincial level. |
