Nauru island, near the equator in the central Pacific Ocean, has been mined for phosphate since 1907 and over 80 million tonnes of phosphate have been exported to Australia, NZ, Britain and other overseas markets. Although superphosphate, prepared from the Nauru rock phosphate has considerable value as an agricultural nutrient, it also contains high concentrations of the toxic metal cadmium. Nauru phosphate deposits have a cadmium content between 100 and 1,000 times the average lithosphere concentration.
From time immemorial it has been the ambition of every Nauruan youth to excel in the snaring of the 'iti', or frigate bird. In the old, far-off days, before the coming of the white man, prowess in capture of the iti was one of the many strenuous tests which marked the transition from youth into manhood, and failure to acquit oneself creditably meant disgrace.
Annual consumption of ozone-depleting substances (ODS). ODS consumption is measured units of ODS tonnes, which is the amount of ODS consumed, multiplied by their respective ozone depleting potential value.
Map of the Nauru Island landcover, with country-level summary of the different classes.
The SPREP ID map is a high resolution (1MB) that shows SPREP member countries with their Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) boundaries developed by the GIS team at SPREP.
The SPREP ID map is low resolution (200KB) that shows SPREP member countries with their Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) boundaries developed by the GIS team at SPREP.
The map is high resolution showing SPREP member countries' Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) boundaries overlaid on a bathymetric base layer that was developed by the GIS team at SPREP.
The map is low resolution showing SPREP member countries' Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) boundaries overlaid on a bathymetric base layer that was developed by the GIS team at SPREP.
As of 1969, the scientific community had no general information on the natural history of Namoluk Atoll in the Eastern Caroline Islands of Micronesia. The only significant published source for the atoll was an ethnographic and linguistic account provided by the German physician.
Climate change is real and Asia is already experiencing its adverse impacts. Projections from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) suggest that such impacts will become even more intense in the future. While the contribution of developing countries in Asia to global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is increasing rapidly, per capita emissions are still low and developmental challenges remain significant.
An earthquake hazard map provides, at any location, the value of a ground motion intensity measure (for example, horizontal peak ground acceleration, PGA) that is expected to be exceeded at least once in 100 year mean return period. The earthquake hazard maps are developed by determining the simulated ground motion intensities at every gridded location for 10,000 realizations of next-year activity of earthquake events. At each grid location, the intensities are ranked and the ground motion intensity of the mean return period of interest is recorded.
AquaMaps are computer-generated predictions of natural occurrence of marine species, based on the environmental tolerance of a given species with respect to depth, salinity, temperature, primary productivity, and its association with sea ice or coastal areas. These 'environmental envelopes' are matched against an authority file which contains respective information for the Oceans of the World. Independent knowledge such as distribution by FAO areas or bounding boxes are used to avoid mapping species in areas that contain suitable habitat, but are not occupied by the species.
The USGS Earthquake Hazards Program of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) is part of the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program (NEHRP) led by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).
Reefs at Risk Revisited is a high-resolution update of the original global analysis, Reefs at Risk: A Map-Based Indicator of Threats to the World’s Coral Reefs. Reefs at Risk Revisited uses a global map of coral reefs at 500-m resolution, which is 64 times more detailed than the 4-km resolution map used in the 1998 analysis, and benefits from improvements in many global data sets used to evaluate threats to reefs (most threat data are at 1 km resolution, which is 16 times more detailed than those used in the 1998 analysis).
Dataset regarding 'Seamounts' - peaks that rise over 1,000 m above the seafloor. Seamount chains occur in all three major ocean basins, with the Pacific having the most number and most extensive seamount chains.
A direct internet link to and resources pertaining the Blue Habitat website which has been established as a portal for information on the global distribution of marine ‘blue’ habitats. Knowledge on the distribution of blue habitats is an important input into ocean management, marine spatial planning and biodiversity conservation.
FAO Agriculture and Fair Trade in Pacific Island Countries. This desk study has been prepared by Winnie Fay Bell and comments were kindly provided by the Pacific Regional Organic Task Force in May 2009
Maps and associated data from the Turtle Research and Monitoring Database System (TREDS). A summary of the database can be found below.
The Turtle Research and Monitoring Database System (TREDS) provides invaluable information for Pacific island countries and territories to manage their turtle resources. TREDS can be used to collate data from strandings, tagging, nesting, emergence and beach surveys as well as other biological data on turtles.