A recent webinar hosted by the Pacific Network on Globalisation (PANG) brought together minds from across the region to delve into the intricate issues of the digital economy and data value.

The webinar’s focus was clear — shed light on who was shaping the rules of the digital landscape and how these rules were taking form.

At the forefront of the discussion was the delicate matter of valuing and protecting indigenous knowledge.

PANG’s deputy coordinator, Adam Wolfenden, emphasised the need for open conversations spanning various sectors.

“It is a call to understand and safeguard the wisdom embedded in Pacific worldviews and indigenous knowledge systems as we venture into the digital world,” he said.

But amid the promise of the digital age, challenges persisted.

Wolfenden said the Pacific’s scattered islands faced the formidable obstacle of connectivity.

“Communities yearn to tap into online technologies, yet structural barriers stand tall. The connectivity challenges and structural barriers that are faced by the Pacific region are substantial and there is no easy, cheap fix,” he said.

He underscored the necessity of regional partnerships, even beyond the Pacific.

“As they sought to build advanced digital infrastructures, they realised that strength lay in unity. The journey towards progress means joining hands with fellow developing nations.

“It is a testament to the shared dream of progress that transcends geographical boundaries.”

The first step, Wolfenden believed, was awareness.

He said the Pacific region needed to be fully informed about ongoing negotiations, what rules were being carved, and how these might affect the region’s autonomy and data sovereignty.

“Often, these negotiations remain hidden from public view, shrouded in secrecy until agreements were reached. This has to change; transparency is vital,” Wolfenden said.

Beyond this, there was a call for broader discussions during the webinar. The digital economy was not just about buyers and sellers in a virtual marketplace.

It was about preserving culture, empowering communities, and ensuring that indigenous knowledge was never left vulnerable to the whims of the digital age.

Ema Ganivatu and Brittany Nawaqatabu are final year journalism students at The University of the South Pacific. They are also senior editors for Wansolwara, USP Journalism’s student training newspaper and online publications. Republished in a collaborative partnership with Asia Pacific Report.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The signing of the memorandum of understanding between the University of the South Pacific’s vice-chancellor and president, Professor Pal Ahluwalia, and the Indian government’s National Centre for Coastal Research, Ministry of Earth Sciences, in March for the setting up of a Sustainable Coastal and Ocean Research Institute (SCORI) has raised serious questions about leadership at USP.

Critics have been asking how this project poses significant risk to the credibility of the institution as well as the security of ocean resources and knowledge sovereignty of the region.

The partnership was formally launched last week by India’s High Commissioner to Fiji, Palaniswamy Subramanyan Karthigeyan, but the questions remain.

Regional resource security threat
Article 8 of the MOU regarding the issue of intellectual property and commercialisation
states:

“In case research is carried out solely and separately by the Party or the research results are obtained through sole and separate efforts of either Party,  The Party concerned alone will apply for grant of Intellectual Property Right (IPR) and once granted, the IPR will be solely owned by the concerned Party.”

This is a red flag provision which gives the Indian government unlimited access to scientific data, coastal indigenous knowledge and other forms of marine biodiversity within the 200 exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and territorial waters of sovereign countries in the Pacific.

More than that, through the granting of IPR, it will claim ownership of all the data and indigenous knowledge generated. This has potential for biopiracy, especially the theft of
local knowledge for commercial purposes by a foreign power.

No doubt this will be a serious breach of the sovereignty of Pacific Island States whose
ocean resources have been subjected to predatory practices by external powers over the
years.

The coastal indigenous knowledge of Pacific communities have been passed down
over generations and the UN’s World Intellectual Property Organisations (WIPO) has developed protocols to protect indigenous knowledge to ensure sustainability and survival
of vulnerable groups.

The MOU not only undermines the spirit of WIPO, it also threatens the knowledge sovereignty of Pacific people and this directly contravenes the UN Convention of Biodiversity which attempts to protect the knowledge of biodiversity of indigenous
communities.

In this regard, it also goes against the protective intent of the UN Convention on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples which protects resources of marginalised groups.

This threat is heightened by the fact that the Access Benefit and Sharing protocol under the Nagoya Convention has not been developed in most of the Pacific Island Countries. Fiji has developed a draft but it still needs to be refined and finalised and key government departments are made aware of it.

Traditional knowledge of coastal eco-systems of Pacific people are critical in mitigation and adaptation to the increasing threat of climate change as well as a means of collective survival.

For Indian government scientists (who will run the institute), masquerading as USP
academics, claiming ownership of data generated from these knowledge systems will pose
serious issues of being unethical, culturally insensitive, predatory and outright illegal in
relation to the laws of the sovereign states of the Pacific as well as in terms of international
conventions noted above.

Furthermore, India, which is a growing economic power, would be interested in Pacific
Ocean resources such as seabed mining of rare metals for its electrification projects as well
as reef marine life for medicinal or cosmetic use and deep sea fishing.

The setting up of SCORI will enable the Indian government to facilitate these interests using USP’s regional status as a Trojan horse to carry out its agenda in accessing our sea resources across the vast Pacific Ocean.

India is also part of the QUAD Indo-Pacific strategic alliance which also includes the US, Australia and Japan.

There is a danger that SCORI will, in implicit ways, act as India’s strategic maritime connection in the Pacific thus contributing to the already escalating regional geo-political contestation between China and the “Western” powers.

This is an affront to the Pacific people who have been crying out for a peaceful and harmonious region.

The 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent, signed by the leaders of the Pacific, tries to guard against all these. Just a few months after the strategy was signed, USP, a regional
institution, has allowed a foreign power to access the resources of the Blue Pacific Continent without the consent and even knowledge of the Pacific people.

So in short, USP’s VCP, Professor Pal Ahluwalia, has endorsed the potential capture of the sovereign ownership of our oceanic heritage and opening the window for unrestricted exploitation of oceanic data and coastal indigenous knowledge of the Pacific.

This latest saga puts Professor Ahluwalia squarely in the category of security risk to the region and regional governments should quickly do something about it before it is too late, especially when the MOU had already been signed and the plan is now a reality.

Together with Professor Sushil Kumar (Director of Research) and Professor Surendra Prasad (Head of the School of Agriculture, Geography, Ocean and Natural Sciences), both of whom are Indian nationals, he has to be answerable to the leaders and people of the region.

Usurpation of state protocol
The second major issue relates to why the Fiji government was not part of the agreement,
especially because a foreign government is setting up an institute on Fiji’s territory.

This is different from the regular aid from Australia, New Zealand and even China where state donors maintain a “hands-off” approach out of respect for the sovereignty of Fiji as well as the independence of USP as a regional institution.

In this case a foreign power is actually setting up an entity in Fiji’s national realm in a regional institution.

As a matter of protocol, was the Fiji government aware of the MOU? Why was there no
relevant provision relating to the participation of the Fiji government in the process?

This is a serious breach of political protocol which Professor Ahluwalia has to be accountable for.

Transparency and consultation
For such a major undertaking which deals with Pacific Ocean resources, coastal people’s
livelihood and coastal environment and their potential exploitation, there should have been
a more transparent, honest and extensive consultation involving governments, regional
organisations, civil society and communities who are going to be directly affected.

This was never done and as a result the project lacks credibility and legitimacy. The MOU itself provided nothing on participation of and benefits to the regional governments, regional organisations and communities.

In addition, the MOU was signed on the basis of a concept note rather than a detailed plan
of SCORI. At that point no one really knew what the detailed aims, rationale, structure,
functions, outputs and operational details of the institute was going to be.

There is a lot of secrecy and manoeuvrings by Professor Ahluwalia and academics from mainland India who are part of a patronage system which excludes regional Pacific and Indo-Fijian scholars.

Undermining of regional expertise
Regional experts on ocean, sustainability and climate at USP were never consulted, although some may have heard of rumours swirling around the coconut wireless. Worse still, USP’s leading ocean expert, an award-winning regional scholar of note, was sidelined and had to resign from USP out of frustration.

The MOU is very clear about SCORI being run by “experts” from India, which sounds more like a takeover of an important regional area of research by foreign researchers.

These India-based researchers have no understanding of the Pacific islands, cultures, maritime and coastal environment and work being done in the area of marine studies in the Pacific. The sidelining of regional staff has worsened under the current VCP’s term.

Another critical question is why the Indian government did not provide funding for the
existing Institute of Marine Resources (IMR) which has been serving the region well for
many years. Not only will SCORI duplicate the work of IMR, it will also overshadow its operation and undermine regional expertise and the interests of regional countries.

Wake up to resources capture
The people of the Pacific must wake up to this attempt at resources capture by a big foreign power under the guise of academic research.

Our ocean and intellectual resources have been unscrupulously extracted, exploited and stolen by corporations and big powers in the past. SCORI is just another attempt to continue this predatory and neo-colonial practice.

The lack of consultation and near secrecy in which this was carried out speaks volume about a conspiratorial intent which is being cunningly concealed from us.

SCORI poses a serious threat to our resource sovereignty, undermines Fiji’s political protocol, lacks transparency and good governance and undermines regional expertise. This
is a very serious abuse of power with unimaginable consequences to USP and indeed the
resources, people and governments of our beloved Pacific region.

This has never been done by a USP VC and has never been done in the history of the Pacific.

The lack of consultation in this case is reflective of a much deeper problem. It also manifests ethical corruption in the form of lack of transparency, denial of support for regional staff, egoistic paranoia and authoritarian management as USP staff will testify.

This has led to unprecedented toxicity in the work environment, irretrievable breakdown of basic university services and record low morale of staff. All these have rendered the university dysfunctional while progressively imploding at the core.

If we are not careful, our guardianship of “Our Sea of Islands,” a term coined by the
intellectually immortal Professor Epeli Hau’ofa, will continue to be threatened. No doubt Professor Hau’ofa will be wriggling around restlessly in his Wainadoi grave if he hears about this latest saga.

This article has been contributed to Asia Pacific Report by researchers seeking to widen debate about the issues at stake with the new SCORI initiative.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

RNZ Pacific

A young Māori activist has told delegates at a massive UN summit in Scotland the world’s climate crisis has its roots in colonialism and that the solution lies in abandoning modern-day forms of it.

India Logan-Riley was asked at the last minute to speak at today’s opening session of the COP26 summit in Glasgow.

They said indigenous resistance to resource exploitation, corporate greed and the promotion of justice had led the way in offering real solutions to climate chaos.

Addressing delegates today, the young activist fearlessly linked imperialism’s lust for resources and its destruction of indigenous cultures centuries ago, to modern-day enablement by governments of corporate giants seeking profit from fossil fuels at any cost.

Logan-Riley said the roots of the climate crisis began with imperialist expansion by Western nations and reminded Britain’s leader Boris Johnson of the colonial crimes committed against subject peoples, including those in Aotearoa.

Māori and other indigenous people had been forced off the land so resources could be extracted, Logan-Riley said.

“Two-hundred-fifty-two years ago invading forces sent by the ancestors of this presidency arrived at my ancestors’ territories, heralding an age of violence, murder and destruction enabled by documents, like the Document of Discovery, formulated in Europe.

Land ‘stolen by British Crown’
“Land in my region was stolen by the British Crown in order to extract oil and suck the land of all its nutrients while seeking to displace people.”

Logan-Riley said the same historic forces continued to be at play in Aotearoa, citing the example of the government’s “theft of the foreshore and seabed” and subsequent corporate drive to extract fossil fuels.

They expressed frustration that after being lauded at the Paris talks five years ago for relaying climate warnings of wildfires, biodiversity loss and sea-level rises, nothing since had changed.

“The global north colonial governments and corporations fudge with the future,” they added.

Logan-Riley said world leaders needed to listen to indigenous people as they had many of the answers to the climate crisis. Their acts of resistance had already played a part in keeping emissions down, they added.

“We’re keeping fossil fuels in the ground and stopping fossil fuel expansion. We’re halting infrastructure that would increase emissions and saying no to false solutions,” they said.

“In the US and Canada alone indigenous resistance has stopped or delayed greenhouse gas pollution equivalent to at least one quarter of annual emissions. What we do works.”

‘Complicit’ in death and destruction
Failure to support such indigenous challenges to the “colonial project” and acceptance instead of mediocre leaders means you too are complicit in death and destruction across the globe, Logan-Riley warned.

The comments come as other climate activists have criticised the G20 summit on climate action ahead of the COP26 meeting.

Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi, who chaired the G20 gathering in Rome, today hailed the final accord, saying that for the first time all G20 states had agreed on the importance of capping global warming at the 1.5C level that scientists say is vital to avoid disaster.

As it stands, the world is heading towards 2.7C.

G20 pledged to stop financing coal power overseas, they set no timetable for phasing it out at home, and watered down the wording on a promise to reduce emissions of methane — another potent greenhouse gas.

The final G20 statement includes a pledge to halt financing of overseas coal-fired power generation by the end of this year, but set no date for phasing out coal power, promising only to do so “as soon as possible”.

This replaced a goal set in a previous draft of the final statement to achieve this by the end of the 2030s, showing the strong resistance from some coal-dependent countries.

G20 set no ‘phasing out’ date
The G20 also set no date for phasing out fossil fuel subsidies, saying they will aim to do so “over the medium term”.

On methane, which has a more potent but less lasting impact than carbon dioxide on global warming, leaders diluted their wording from a previous draft that pledged to “strive to reduce our collective methane emissions significantly”.

The final statement just recognises that reducing methane emissions is “one of the quickest, most feasible and most cost-effective ways to limit climate change”.

“I just wanted to really convey that the negotiations are the same age as me and admissions are still going up and that needs to stop right now,” they said.

Logan-Riley had opened their address in te reo Māori before telling delegates they resided on Aotearoa’s east coast, where the sun had turned red in February last year because of smoke from wildfires in eastern Australia.

The activist relayed a story about supporting their brother in hospital being told by the doctor there staff were seeing higher numbers of people presenting with breathing problems because of the smoke.

“In that moment our health was bound to the struggle of the land and people in another country. In the effects of climate change are fates intertwined, as our the historic forces that have brought us here today,” they said.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Dr Haunani-Kay Trask, a Hawai’ian leader and sovereignty activist with a distinguished career as an academic at the University of Hawai’i, died today at age 71.

The sovereignty organisation Ka Lahui Hawai‘i on Facebook shared a post recalling Trask’s legacy, “We love you our great kumu, leader, and voice for our Lahui! Ue na lani.”

Trask began teaching at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa in 1981 and became the founding director of the university’s Centre for Hawaiian Studies, although her influence was not limited to her academic career.

“She dedicated her life to the plight of Hawaiians, for the return of our lands and for the path toward sovereignty,” said Ka Lahui Hawai‘i spokeswoman Healani Sonoda-Pale in a statement.

“Her voice was an important voice in our movement — probably the most important voice in our movement — in terms of uplifting, educating and empowering our people.”

Trask retired from her position at UH in 2010 but remained active in promoting Hawai’ian culture and rights. The university in April announced that Trask had been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Kekuewa Kikiloi, director of the UH Kamakakuokalani Centre for Hawai’ian Studies, said in a statement that Trask was a visionary leader of the Hawai’ian sovereignty movement.

inspired critical thinking
“She served her career as tenured professor in our department inspiring critical thinking and making important contributions in areas of settler colonialism and indigenous self-determination,” Kikiloi said in an email.

“More importantly, she was a bold, fearless, and vocal leader that our lahui needed in a critical time when Hawaiian political consciousness needed to be nurtured. Our center mourns her passing and sends our aloha and to the Trask ‘ohana.

“Our department remains committed to carrying on the legacy of Professor Trask in educating and empowering the lahui.”

Hawai‘inuiakea School of Hawai’ian Knowledge dean Jonathan Kamakawiwo‘ole Osorio also provided a statement following the news of Trask’s death.

“Professor Trask was a fearless advocate for the Kanaka Maoli (Native Hawai’ians) and was responsible for inspiring thousands of brilliant and talented Hawaiians to come to the University of Hawai‘i,” Osorio said in a statement.

“But she also inspired our people everywhere to embrace their ancestry and identity as Hawai’ians and to fight for the restoration of our nation. She gave everything she had as a person to our Lahui and her voice, her writing and her unrelenting passion for justice will, like our Queen, always represent our people.

“E ola mau loa e Haunani Kay Trask, ‘aumakua of the poet warrior.”

Sonoda-Pale said Trask had been ill for some time, but did not disclose the details of her situation.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Indigenous people fought alongside youth movements in the creation of an Indonesian nation. But, in the historical writing of Indonesia’s struggle for independence from colonial powers, stories of Indigenous people’s role are nearly non-existent compared to that of the elite educated youth leaders.

This lack of representation reflects the marginalisation of Indigenous peoples, which continued throughout Indonesia’s 75 years of independence.

Indigenous people, whose traditional knowledge and way of life proved to be a force to be reckoned with during the current covid-19 pandemic and who for generations serve as guardians of forests and natural environments, continue to be stigmatised and experience oppression in their own country.

Nearly 20 million, out of a total of 268 million Indonesians, Indigenous peoples are often being associated with “dirty, primitive, underdeveloped, alien, to forest encroacher.”

The stigma resulted in them being underrepresented, either economically, socially, politically, and culturally.

In addition, these communities suffered oppression from the government’s economic driven investment, evicting them from their customary lands to make way for large scale forestry, mining, and plantations.

Freedom fighters
History books barely mention how Indigenous peoples took arms with the Youth movement during the struggle for independence and helped to finally established the Republic of Indonesia.

Rukka Sombolinggi, who comes from the Toraja tribe in South Sulawesi, recalled the experience of her own family. She said that her great grandfather and grandfather were freedom fighters who fought along with students.

Rukka is the secretary-general of the Alliance of Indigenous Peoples of the Archipelago (AMAN). The alliance currently represents 2366 indigenous communities throughout Indonesia or more than 18 million individual members.

“My grandfather died as a veteran. The history might not have recorded Indigenous Peoples’ roles for fighting the colonialism, but there were hundreds of thousands of them who died in the wars. Unfortunately, history recorded only the youths movements,” said Sombolinggi.

Sandra Moniaga, a Commissioner for Assessment and Research at the National Commission of Human Rights (Komnas HAM), said the majority of Indigenous Peoples, such as Sedulur Sikep in Java, were among the groups who rejected to collaborate with the Dutch colonialists.

Moniaga added that Indigenous peoples have a unique contribution to Indonesia’s struggle for independence. “They preserve Indonesia’s local cultures, protecting our identity as a nation known with hundreds of tribes and cultures,” she said.

Forest guardians
Most of Indigenous peoples’ customary lands are within and near the country’s forests. They play a huge role in protecting the country’s forest and natural environment.

In her recent study about the Marind-Anim Indigenous Peoples in Merauke Regency, Papua Province, anthropologist Sophie Chao who has been living among them for more than a decade, mentioned how the tribe is “caring for the forest, respectable to plants and animals, and nourishing relationships with the natural world”.

Under the administration of Indonesia’s first president Sukarno, Indigenous peoples got their recognition through the State’ agrarian law in 1960.

The law was the first to mention Indigenous peoples. But it stipulates that customary law applies as long as it aligns with national and State interests.

After Soeharto took power in 1966, there was systematic destruction on customary rights during the New Order, according to Sandra.

She said that the government carried out land-grabbing by issuing forest permits on customary lands for forestry, mining and large scale plantations.

“Most of these customary lands were also claimed by the government to be handed over to migrants and TNI (the army) or the police,” she added.

Towards recognition of Indigenous rights
Things started to change for Indigenous peoples in following the end of Soeharto’s rule in 1998.

The 4th Amendment of the 1945 Constitution enacted in 2000 acknowledged their “traditional existence” and “traditional way of life”.

This became the legal basis for the Constitutional Court to rule out customary lands (Hutan Adat) as State’s forests in 2012, or locally known as MK35.

Another progress, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo had revived the Indigenous Peoples Bill, which will strengthen Indigenous peoples’ existence in the Republic and to resolve ongoing conflicts related to customary lands.

“Still, it is difficult to realise these regulations. Instead of RUU MHA (Indigenous Peoples Bill), the government and lawmakers are more eager to pass the Omnibus Law on Job Creation,” slammed Rukka Sombolinggi.

She said currently, Indigenous peoples are facing another form of “colonialism”. Since decentralisation in 2001, the regents and governors were the ones issuing permits over Customary Forest without their consent.

“We are no longer fighting foreign companies, but locals, like the bupati (head of regent), the governor. Their own people,” she said citing Sukarno’s famous speech: “My struggle was easier because it was to expel the colonialists, but yours will be more difficult because it is against your own people.”

Moving forward
During the pandemic, Indigenous peoples that are still practising their traditional knowledge are considered to be the most resilient groups because of their closeness to nature.

“Indigenous peoples who are guarding their areas and not massively exploited their resources and have the spirit of sharing, they have strong resilience against this pandemic. They can even provide their own food,” said Rukka Sombolinggi.

Meanwhile, those who are exposed to modernisation or in conflict with the industries suffer from unemployment, food security, and lacking in health, clean water and sanitation access.

“The claim and promises from big corporations to provide food, open access to education, or employment, they are now becoming helpless due to the characteristic of the virus,” Sombolinggi added.

Sophie Chao admired the courage, resilience, endurance, and creativity of Indigenous Peoples, in general, in the face of ongoing threats to their lands and ways of life.

“For me, my hope is that the cultures and values of Indigenous Peoples will be fully recognised, protected, and promoted by the Indonesian state and by the international community,” said Chao.

“This means making sure that their rights to land are guaranteed, that their full consent is sought where development projects are being planned, and their development takes place in a bottom-up way, based on Masyarakat Adat‘s own aspirations, dreams, and hopes.”

Rukka Sombolinggi, secretary-general of the Alliance of Indigenous Peoples of the Archipelago (AMAN), and Sandra Moniaga, a Commissioner for Assesment and Research at the National Commission of Human Rights (Komnas HAM) were interviewed for this article, part of a series to commemorate Indonesian Independence Day on August 17. Fidelis Eka Satriastanti is editor of Lingkungan Hidup, The Conversation. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Pacific Media Watch

A University of Waikato researcher says some of the current colonial representations of climate change in the Pacific are obscuring Pacific voices and failing to recognise the importance of Indigenous knowledge in the fight against the changing climate.

Dr Jessica Pasisi’s thesis, Niue Women’s Perspective and Experiences of Climate Change – a Hiapo Aproach, brings together experiences and perceptions of climate change from 12 Niuean women, drawing attention to the role Indigenous knowledge, language and cultural practice can have in fighting climate change.

She says while Indigenous communities in the Pacific are on the frontline of some of the most severe impacts of climate change, the very same Pacific communities are also often fighting to be heard on the issue, commonly being presented through a colonial lens.

READ MORE: Niue Women’s Perspective and Experiences of Climate Change – a Hiapo Approach

“While Pacific leaders fight to be heard, our people are also fighting to reclaim and draw attention to Indigenous knowledge, language and cultural practice as key areas for strategies of sustainability and resilience,” said Dr Pasisi.

Dr Pasisi said mainstream media focused on headlines such as, “How to save a sinking island nation.” Or, “Australia to help Pacific neighbours adapt to climate change”, but it eroded Pacific people’s agency and failed to recognise the work already underway in the Pacific by many Pacific organisations, as well as ancestral knowledge that had ensured the survival of Pacific people for generations.

It also failed to reflect the island nations’ solidarity in drawing attention to the issue of climate change and fighting for larger emitting nations and corporations to be held accountable for their inaction and indifference.

“Climate change is a massive risk and something facing the Pacific as a whole and you will find in most islands people are calling to have their own voice on the issue, to control the narrative and speak their own truth, but also to be in positions where they influence and lead decision making,” said Dr Pasisi.

Building a platform
Of Niuean descent, Dr Pasisi hopes her research will build a platform to broaden the conversation among academics, researchers and consultants working on climate change in the Pacific and recognise the agency of Pacific people at a grassroots level.

“Research of climate change in the Pacific is still largely conducted by outsiders. It is really important that our stories are told by our people in our own ways, that’s why I argue these Niue women’s experiences and perspectives are vital for how we understand and respond to climate change,” says Dr Pasisi.

The women traverse topics from the impacts of tourism, to migration within and outside the islands and the loss of language and cultural practice that informs the sustainable management of environmental resources.

“These women’s stories are important and powerful because their insight and culturally specific knowledge has value in grappling with the complex changes caused by climate change,” said Dr Pasisi.

She said it was important to recognise people who held knowledge were not always in positions of power.

She plans to convert her research into a book and continue working with Niue communities in Aotearoa and Niue.

“I want to give encouragement that Pacific people’s voices do matter. It’s through these people we can challenge the dominant Eurocentric coverage of climate change and see the realities, possibilities and broader underlying issues that are being compounded in the Pacific by climate change.”

A University of Waikato media release.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz