Photos from the Kimadi and Magubem marine protected areas launching

http://www.facebook.com/n/?groups%2F210718705711207%2F&mid=6c3525eG20735b4fGb104cdbG15&bcode=LNVAbcrL_1.1348031792.AaSvo9N3YuUm0lzr&n_m=magun.wences%40gmail.com

Magubem and Kimadi people establish marine protected area to save turtles using customary practise

Nganeg Kak

 

Greetings from home!

 

Thought I should just brief you on the happenings at Gidlipasi as of late.

 

Last Friday saw the renewal of the forest conservation agreement between 8 clans from Yambarik, Imbap, Simbukanam and Tokain 1.

 

Banak Gamui from PNG Institute of Biological Research (Goroka) was the guest of honour. Present also were a two-men team (media) from BRG. Present also were Gabu and Yorba. Also neighbours from Dimer and Murukanam were present, to witness the event.

 

The agreement was sealed in custom, and will be signed at a later date...

 

And yesterday saw the custom sealing of the marine conservation at Magubem and Kimadi. The Malas community came with a grand singsing to lead the welcome ceremony.

 

Guests included, Liberty from Misima, Banak Gamui from IBR, the team from BRG, Gabu, Markus from Niugini Binatang Research Centre (Nagada), Yat Paol representing MAKATA, and a TCF team including Catherine Sparks, Ken Wilson, and Dan Porras. Murukanam and Musuat (Wanumas at Malas) had a strong presence at the occasion.

 

Gildipasi people came all the way from Yambarik and Imbap and Kademdugu adn Yadigam to witness yesterday's event.

 

I was given time to speak on behalf of MAKATA and I started with relaying your sincere apologies as well as commitment to continued partnership of a different nature.

 

Gidlidpasi in response, acknowledged MAKATA's ground work in getting Gildipasi to this point where two communities sealed their agreement to protect their marine region....

 

This should be it for now....

 

Ongone Kak

yatwww.linkedin.com/pub/wences-magun/27/452/744/

Video on experimental deep sea mining

http://www.sopac.org/dsm/index.php/under-pressure-documentary

Wences Magun's Full Script on TVNZ

"TVNZ Pacific Governments are being urged to protect their deep sea
mineral resources, reports TVNZ. Watch the news report:

http://tvnz.co.nz/world-news/interest-in-deep-sea-drilling-grows-pacific-video-5391034"

Here's the full script:

Wence Magun grabs

I represent the Civil Society of Papua New Guinea to air our concerns
on deep sea mining. My name is Wenceslaus Magun, from Mas Kagin Tapani
Association – it’s a local NGO. Mas Kagin Tapani stands for ‘Guardians
of the sea’. Our primary focus is to protect the critically endangered
leatherback turtle here in Madang, but we also address threats to the
marine environment, and one of those biggest threats to the marine
environment is the deep sea mining that Nautilus is taking the lead
in, in establishing its project, Solwara 1, in Papua New Guinea.

I’m here not only to represent the Mas Kagin Tapani Association, but a
coalition of NGO and civil society groups that are speaking up on the
issue of deep sea mining in PNG. And the coalition of groups include
Friends of the Earth Australia, Canada Mine Watch, other local NGOs in
PNG including Bismarck Ramu Group, Act Now, and the local communities
as well as academics like Professor Chalapan Kuluwin from the
University of Papua New Guinea and other interested stakeholders.

I think it’s both. I think it’s both. We feel that the process of
issuing a mining license to deep sea mining was rushed. There was not
enough consultation with all stakeholders, a lack of information to
the resource owners, to Papua New Guineans at large. And when you
leave people in darkness, people are afraid. People’s livelihood
depends on marine resources, and the people of the Bismarck Solomon
Seas do not want to be exploited at the whims of their ignorance. That’s
why we have this body that becomes the voice of the voiceless majority
of the people of the Bismarck Solomon Seas. We want to be their ears,
their eyes, their mouth, and that’s the very reason why I’m here, to
represent them, to express their concerns to all the stakeholders. And
I’m glad I’m here and I’m with the mining company, the governments of
all the Pacific Island countries plus NGOs, and I’m glad I’m able to
express our concerns to this group of people so they know that we are
concerned. We don’t want hasty decisions to be made, and the
subsequent result of that would be the damage to the environment and
subsequently affecting our food source.

The miners are telling us that the demand is on deep sea mining now,
and it will happen, but we are getting a very good presentation from
some of the presenters here – one of them is Mary, who is very good in
mining contract law – and she’s advising us not to rush. We must be
prepared. We must plan. We must know what we want to achieve, and that
falls in line with the precautionary principle. And according to
Professor Chalapan Kaluwin it takes 10 to 15 years – even 20 years –
for you to adhere to the precautionary principle before you can
actually go into the deal to allow mining to take place. And look at
Papua New Guinea – it’s not even 10 to 15 years. We’re rushing the
process. What’s the rush? Papua New Guineans are not on life support,
and I’m sure Pacific Islanders are not on life support. We’ve been
living on our land and off our sea for ages. We can’t die if our
marine resources are not being exploited. We’ll still live on fish.
We’ll still live on our garden produce. So who is actually the one who
is going to suffer? I think it’s the miners – not the resource owners,
not Papua New Guineans, not Tongans, not Fijians.

So how urgent is the need to mine? It’s only to make mobile phones and
rockets to the moon – or fighting weapons so they can go and kill each
other in other countries. Not here in Papua New Guinea. We have to see
the contract. Unless we see the contract, we will know exactly how
much benefit we are going to get from that contract agreement. And I
asked the director from the solicitor’s office from Papua New Guinea
yesterday if we could have an access to that contract, and she said
no, we can’t, because the matter is before arbitration. So you see
right now, we don’t know what the deal is, how much benefit we are
going to get. Yet they tell us that we are going to provide these
community services, we’re going to pay tax to the government – when
are they going to pay tax? I think they’re going to give a tax holiday
to the mining company for the next five to 10 years. So in real
essence, they have to actually tell us exactly how much money we’re
going to get. Mining companies have been in Papua New Guinea since independence,
the largest is Bougainville copper mine. Then you have Ok Tedi. And
you have Porgera. But you see, the GDP for Papua New Guinea is very
low. When I came across to Fiji and I changed 100 kina, I only got 75
Fijian dollars. So that really shows that the currency in PNG is low,
despite the fact that we have so many mining companies in the country.

So what proof can you tell me that a seabed mine would make a
difference. The phase of seabed mine, in Solwara 1, is for only two
years. And the area is very small compared to Ok Tedi and Bougainville
copper mine and Porgera and Ramu Nickel. So I don’t think the economic
monetary value that we’re going to get from Solwara 1 will exceed that
of the land mines. So what the rush? Let us exhaust all the land-based
mine first. In the contract we said, ‘okay, thank you mining company
to come and do the exploration. Give us time to peruse your documents
first and give us time to see when we will give you the green light to
go and do that.’ So let’s stick to that. This is our resource – don’t
rush. You must also think of the future generation, because if you
exploit everything now, what about 20 years from now? What about 50
years from now? What resources will your children fall back on to
exploit, to get the revenue from? So always always take this
precautionary message – no rush, don’t rush.

I’m not supporting land mine either, but there’s already enough land
mines going on in Papua New Guinea, so why do they want to go into
deep sea mining when they’re already making money from land mine?
That’s my concern here. Not do this presentation [?7.41] so that
there’s going to be small impact, small footprints in terms of deep
sea mining, but this is theory – it has not been proven. There has
never been a deep sea mining occurring in anywhere in the world from
that depth – 5000 metres deep. So theory is one thing, but actually
doing it and experiencing the impact of that is another thing, so I’m
not going to buy into what Nautilus has said. Cos like all miners,
they have to come up with something to convince the government of the
day to give them the licence to mine the Solwara. So at this stage we’d
rather say that, let them go and do it in Canada first, or let them go
and do it in US or elsewhere, but not in Papua New Guinea. We have to
be cautious. Okay, that technique, that technology may be proven to be
the best and the safest, but it has never been proven. You cannot go
to one library and pick up the document and read it and say, oh these
are the impacts from deep sea mining and these are the risks so these
are the mitigating steps – no, there’s none. So I’m not going to buy
easily to what the presentation of Nautilus is or the other miners in
this forum.

We want to give credit to Web 2.0  Web 2.0 tools has widened the
opportunity for telephone conferencing, getting the information across
to the broader audience, particularly the millennial the teenagers,
the college students, the university students, the academia, who have
access to this and then you have the mobile – you can tweet and then
someone in the rural area in Papua New Guinea can easily get the
message. Oh just yesterday I received a telephone from Karkum Village
– telephone call to Digicel, so you don’t have to change your sim
card, you can still maintain your same sim card and roam the Pacific
region and still communicate with your parents in the village. So
that’s the advantage of the communication system, the Web 2.0 tool
that has enabled us to link up with each other and enabled us to
communicate on these issues, and enabled us to amplify our voices to
our broader audience and reach our target audience, key stakeholders,
to make the impact and to achieve the difference that we want to
achieve. So in a sense I would say that it’s good we use all
communication tools, not just the traditional print media or
television, because these other Web 2.0 tools are very powerful and
we’ve managed to use it and we’ve seen the impact of it. So it’s good.

I have a project in Madang and I am also from Bagabag Island. My
genealogy goes back to four different islands of Madang province:
Manam Island, Karkar Island, Bagabag Island and the coastal village of
Riwo And my parents probably their genealogy extends, so I don’t know
all the roots. So if I speak, I speak for my people who said NO to
mine the resources, the marine resources. I speak first and foremost
for my own family, my immediate family, my clans people, my tribal
people, my Island people. Then I speak for the people that I work for
and work with. And then I speak for and on behalf of the people of the
Bismarck Solomon Seas where I’m mandated to represent them in this
forum through that group that we’ve established and who nominated me
to come here. So I don’t represent myself in this workshop, I
represent a broader audience and the indigenous, the first people of
Papua New Guinea.

I realise that is very very important, because without a civil
society, you won’t get the other side of the coin. Because you see the
government [Indistinct 11.50] – I don’t see them asking challenging
questions. They’re just sitting down there, very passive, ‘yes’, they
are nodding with the companies. So there’s really no voice for the
people in the village, because the government is sitting on the middle
bench, trying to win the companies, and at the same time trying to
represent the civil society. So you can’t address some of those
particular issues if you don’t have the civil society rep in these
type of workshops or even in negotiating table. You must have the
civil society reps as well, and your reps, and then you must have
resource owners. Then you must have the government and the mining
company, and then you have the technocrats who will give you the
technical knowledge and ideas and expert advice on how to deal with
the different issues and steps and approaches in order to actually
establish a contract and go into the mining activity. So I’m glad
SOPAC has invited the civil society reps to participate in this
meeting, because I can see that most of the questions are coming from
the civil society reps, and this is the healthy part of this type of
workshop. Because if you just keep everything to yourself and at the
end of the day you go back home and then you don’t address those
issues, then who is going to suffer? You are going to be the one
suffering.

You need to make a fair representation of your people in this type of
workshops. So I think it’s healthy for all stakeholders to come to
this type of workshop, particularly from the civil society, from the
NGOs, because we work directly with the people at the grassroot level
and daily we hear their problems, hear their concerns. And they don’t
have a voice. So we are their voices, and I’m glad I’m here and I’m
able to ask some very critical questions. Some questions that I’ve
asked most probably didn’t go down well to the hearts and minds of
some stakeholders, but I’m glad I raised it, and the last question I
raised to the government representatives from Tonga and Fiji, Cook
Islands and Papua New Guinea was, do you have the capital ability to
mitigate risks pertaining to the aftermath of the mining activities of
deep sea mining after the company exit? Or have you incorporated that
cost into the contract so that the mining companies responsible in
extracting minerals, copper, gold, zinc, whatever from your deep sea
mining are going to put some money aside for that to happen, in the
event they wake up and some unforeseeable catastrophe happens. The
delegate from Papua New Guinea said they are reviewing the policy and
the Mining Act to embrace that, but you see, we put the cart before
the mule. We gave the license already to Nautilus and now we’re going
back and reviewing the Mining Act. So there’s some stupid decisions
already being made. Papua New Guinea does not have a seabed mining
law. We just relying on the Mining Act 1992. So there’s some crazy
things going on in Papua New Guinea that I don’t think a sensible
person should accept. Prepare – don’t rush, because haste brings
waste, and we must learn lessons from other countries in the world who
have made hasty decisions and now are suffering.

Africa for that matter, you know they are the most richest country in
the world, but they’re the poorest nation, some of the poorest people
in the entire world - even though they have diamond mines and gold
mines, you name it. And followed by Papua New Guinea – sadly.  Papua
New Guinea, you know they say we are an island of gold floating on
oil, but look at the mortality rate. Literacy rate. The
infrastructure. No way. We are in no way better than Fiji. So these
are lessons that must be learned by our neighboring Pacific Island
countries. You must not make hasty decisions, because mining will not make a big
impact. Even though they say, mining is the bigger contributor of
PNG’s economy, the fact of the matter is that they give us 1 million
kina, they take $200 million US out of the country. That’s why our GDP
is very low. So these lessons must be learned.

I’m glad the rep for Papua New Guinea is saying they’re reviewing the
Mining Act and they will get the Commonwealth Secretariat to raise the
money that we can get from the mining companies. Well do that first!
Make sure that you get the best out of your negotiation! You don’t get
half, or you don’t get less. And that, sadly, has been going on in
Papua New Guinea for the last decades, since independence. So I’m
calling on all the Pacific Island countries to learn lessons from
Papua New Guinea and do not make hasty decisions to just go in and
say, okay, KIOST or Nautilus or Blue Water’s, you come and mine the
deep floor. No, don’t rush. First you must make sure, you must know
what you want, the purpose of you going into that contract agreement.
Exactly what do you want to get? How much benefit do you want your
country to get? You must. Because you know that the mining companies
are here to make profit, and you are there to represent the welfare of
your people, their social needs, their infrastructure needs, their
economic needs. You must think of the future generation as well. If
you reap all the resources now, what do you have left for the future
generations? We are an island country nation. We are not a continent.
So our fallback strategies are our marine resources. Our land
resources are for some reasons very scarce. So you know that your
fallback strategy in terms of your economic resources falls back to
your sustainable resource, which is fishery. So what if deep sea
mining, you don’t think of it, happens to – say [?] [Indistinct 18.18]
the fish stop [?] through the sound of the machines breaking the gold
and the rocks underneath the sea. I raised that up in the workshop.

The issue is, don’t rush. Don’t rush. Even if Nautilus is the best
company - according to their presentation, they claim to say that they
did all the right things, they followed the right processes, their
activity will not affect the environment, the marine resources – I
will say there, don’t rush. Prevention is better than cure, so let’s
not make any hasty decisions here. Let Nautilus go and mine the floors
of Canada first. If they boast of having the best technology in the
world, why don’t they go to Canada and mine their own sea floors
first, and prove to us that it’s safe, it’s friendly, and it’s not
damaging to the environment – then I will say that okay, they’re
proven to have done it in Canada and it’s worked, it’s healthy, it’s
safe and friendly. Okay, why not come back. We don’t want them to use
us as their guinea pigs. We are not their test ground. Because there’s
never been any deep sea mining activity done anywhere else in the
world. So what proof can I rely on? The whole, the nice presentation
from Nautilus. I will not buy in to their presentation. I am a little
bit like Thomas [?19.49] here. And it’s good. It’s good for the people
of Papua New Guinea and for the rest of the Pacific Island countries.
Because the resources are there. We are glad they tell us that we’ve
got so much gold and silver and all this and that they can extract from
the small area like two soccer field, compared to a vast land on the
land. Well, that’s good. That’s what we want to know. But no rush. We
can give our time to our children to go to the best universities and
get the best knowledge on mining, engineering, and geology and all the
technical expertise that we needed. Then let our children go into it.

STARTS 20.38 I want to thank SOPAC for taking the lead in mobilizing
all the stakeholders to come. I think this is the first time that
something like this, a workshop like this, was organized for all
stakeholders: the government representatives, miners, and the civil
society to come and learn the skills of negotiation, and developing
contract that is appealing to all parties in order to get a favorable
benefit. And we’re not just talking on negotiation, benefit sharing –
we’re learning so many other things. We’re learning about what the
miners are doing and the different types of technologies that they’ve
invented to go into deep floor mining, and how they want to mitigate
all those risks. I cannot be just saying that they’re not doing a good
job – no, they are doing a great job. They are doing a lot of studies.
They’re trying their very best to avoid environmental impact to the
environment. ENDS 21.39

So credit must also be given to the miners, but here I’m saying that
we must not make hasty decisions. Prevention is better than cure and I
will say that miners must go back to their own land, mine their sea
resources, prove to us that it’s safe in their own country – then
we’ll buy into a new technology that they’re inventing and boasting to
be the best in the world. No rush. We are not on life support. In
Papua New Guinea we can eat our fish, we can eat our taro and we can
still survive. So that’s my message to all the Pacific Island
countries – don’t rush. If you rush and 10 years from now, and 50
years from now, if you deplete all your resources, you don’t have any
resources to fall back on, then your ancestors will point at you and
say, “Our forefathers did not make wise decision for us.” Remember
the Indian proverb: ‘We are only borrowing from our children.’ So
likewise we must give to our future generation what they truly
deserve, which is a pristine environment: safe, friendly and healthy
for a prosperous nation, prosperous people.

Interview ENDS:22.55

Second DSM Workshop's Summary Report

SECOND REGIONAL TRAINING WORKSHOP ON DEEP SEA MINING LAW AND CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS,

Held In Nukua’lofa Tonga

From 11-15^th March 2013

Summary Report:

Don’t rush to do Deep Sea Mining in the Pacific. Haste Brings Waste!

Acknowledgement

Let me take this opportunity to thank the sponsors of the Second Regional Training Workshop on Deep Sea Mining Law and Contract Negotiations.

I thank the European Union and the Ocean and Islands Program of the SOPAC Division of the Secretariat of the Pacific Commission to facilitate this workshop. I would like to express my special thank you to Hannah Lily, Vira Atalifo, and those who made it possible for me to travel to Tonga at such a short notice. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank Helen Rosenbaum for nominating me to represent the civil society in Papua New Guinea to attend this workshop. Last but not the least a big thank you to my family for allowing me to represent my people at this training.

Introduction

This Summary Report outlined the kind of experience I gained from the workshop.  It points out the lessons learnt, the benefits achieved, setbacks encountered and a few recommendations to help the organising committee improve in the planning for the coming workshop.

Experience Gained:

This workshop helped me learn how to negotiate on behalf of the civil society with the government representatives and the Deep Sea Mining Company.  It also empowered me to learn more on Deep Sea Mining Law and Contract Negotiations in general.  The mock exercise actually gave me a fair idea of how it is actually done in real life situation.  I also gained additional skills, knowledge and lessons from other presenters.

Lessons Learnt:

Some of the key lessons learnt from this workshop include the question I paused to Mary Louise Viteli about the right for all citizens to know about the Content of the Contract Agreement between the State and the DSM company (Nautilus) in this case.  She pointed out that all citizens have the right to know about that and that the State should make it public.  I flag her comments to the representative of the PNG’s Solicitor General’s Office who attended the workshop as a reminder.  I believe this was captured very well by the East Timor nation as shown in the television documentary produced by ABC’s Four Corners in Timor Leste.

This small island nation truly proved to us that they have a fighting spirit and would not sway or be swayed by multi-billion corporate entities such as Woodside and ConocoPhillips to agree to their terms and conditions.  They stood their grounds and argued that they get the fair share of the revenue from their petroleum industry.  They also pushed hard to ensure that the pipeline be connected to their island nation.  They were able to prove to Woodside through a local company Timor Gas and Petroleum that that was possible as proven in the bathometric studies of the sea floor.

They even went against the recommendation by World Bank and used the money from their Sovereign Wealth Fund to build and improve their health, education and agriculture services. 

A key lesson to learn from that video documentary is that they relied on no one but on themselves for the best advice.  This may not be literally true but goes to say that at the end of the day, whatever decision we make should be good for our country and our people based on sound and independent technical advice or evaluation report. 

Another lesson I picked up from that video documentary was that they had a bigger fight ahead of them and that was the need to collect all the tax due to their nation from the petroleum companies operating on their land. 

In addition, mining companies and the respective government representatives, International Seabed Authority and key speakers from SOPAC gave us a clear and in-depth knowledge and understanding of issues dealing with DSM laws, geology and the DSM technologies.  I now have a fair knowledge of deep sea minerals, how mining companies carry out exploration activities in the sea floor, what kinds of equipment they use, the money used to do their work and the risks involved. 

The KIOST’s presentation showed us clearly how they will use their technology to mitigate risks particularly in an event the slurry pipe breaks midway up or down in the ocean.  However, I am not happy with their plans to pump the waste back to the sea.  Neptune also emphasized the process of taking small steps one at a time to ensure that their activities do not cause negative impact to the environment but did not show us the kind of technology they plan to use in DSM.  Nautilus’s presentation showed part of a equipment left in the sea which was found some years later when doing the exploration in the same area.  This is not a good sign and an indicator of careless work attitude. 

Benefits achieved:

This workshop helped me gain more knowledge about deep sea mining, contract law and techniques for negotiation.   I learned about the geology of the earth and the deep sea minerals from Akuila Tawake’s (SOPAC) presentation which was also complemented by Jang Wan Bang’s (KIOST) presentations.   I must also commend Nautilus, KIOST, and Neptune for taking a due diligent process in dealing with the DSM industry.  Speaking to Jang Wang Bang, he pointed out that they will operate within the laws of the State.  That once again brings to attention the need for all Pacific Island nations to ensure that all their Laws, Procedures, Policies, and Strategies MUST be in place prior to issuing exploration and exploitation licenses to DSM companies.  We cannot totally blame DSM companies if we fail to do our part.  As a civil society representative, I am happy that I was able to get our precautionary principle and due diligent messages across to the rest of the participants. 

The setbacks:

The Pacific- ACP States Regional Legislative and Regulatory Framework for Deep Sea Minerals Exploration and Exploitation and the Precautionary Approach In A Deep Sea Mining Content reports,

 should have been sent out to all the participants a month early and not a few weeks before the workshop.   That would give us sufficient time to read and also gauge the views from other stakeholders prior to attending this workshop.

Recommendations for improvement:

I recommend that SOPAC should send us key documents in advance – a month or two leading up to the workshop.  This will give us ample time to gauge views from other members prior to attending the workshop.

Message:

I call on all Pacific Island nations to follow the due diligent and the Precautionary Approach in DSM.  We MUST not rush into DSM as we are not living on life support.  We are a resilient breed of people who have sailed our open seas with sailing canoes and without compass, climbed the tallest and rugged mountains on bare foot, and swam across fast flowing rivers and lakes full of crocodiles, snakes and other dangerous wild animals without safety gears.  Not even the mosquitoes were able to wipe us out of the face of the earth.  We lived off our seas, rivers, lakes and oceans using rudimentary tools for more than 50,000 years.  Who said we will die now if there’s no deep sea mining.  Our land, sea, air and water is our life.  Caution: Don’t Rush. Haste Brings Waste! 

Malo 'au pito

Wenceslaus Magun

The National Coordinator

Mas Kagin Tapani (MKT)

Leatherback Protected Under PNG Laws

From Jeff Kinch: The leatherback turtle is currently the only sea turtle in PNG that is listed as protected fauna under the 1976 Fauna (Protection and Control) Act (Kula and George, 1996), which stipulates that any person who knowingly buys, sells, offers or  consigns for sale, or has in possession or control of a protected animal is guilty of an offence and the penalty is K 500. Any person who takes (kills) a protected animal, in contravention of a condition of a permit is guilty of an offence and the penalty is K 40/animal.

An Open Letter for Sponsorship or In-Kind Donation

www.thenational.com.pg

The article in today's The National Newspaper (Friday 22, March 2013)  has instigated us to make this public appeal for assistance in order to sustain our Sea Turtle Restoration and Protection Project in Madang.
 
MAS KAGIN TAPANI ASSOCIATION
POB 1312, Port Moresby, National Capital District, PNG
+ (675) 71959665
magun.wences@gmail.com • maskagintapani.blogspot.com

Friday 22 March, 2013

To Whom It May Concern

Dear Sir/Madam,

REF: REQUEST FOR SPONSORSHIP

RATIONAL
We are applying for sponsorship or donation of in-kind support for our
marine education awareness program for our Sea Turtle Restoration and
Protection Project in Madang in order to achieve our organizations
project goal and vision to help protect and restore the declining
population of the endangered leatherback turtles and other marine
habitat and biodiversity in Papua New Guinea. We believe your
organisation has been assisting NGO’s and charity groups by way of
donations in cash or kind. Our organizations are in urgent need of
producing educational awareness materials, video documentaries,
promotional materials, and meetings and awareness for all our coastal
and offshore island schools in Madang.

BACKGROUND
Our organisation is at present adapting an alternative to marine
protected areas, using the conservation deeds approach which are
created and managed by communities not regulators.
Conservation deeds in Papua New Guinea are the result of a
community-driven process that creates a locally managed conservation
area, and a long term community stake in the protection of natural
resources in ways that also meet the economic and social needs of the
community.

We are now applying this model to coastal/maritime communities of
Madang as our pilot project site in Papua New Guinea. We envision a
maritime conservation process planned and implemented by the partners:
each local (coastal) community, Gildipasi planning committee (local
CBO), Mirap and KarKum (Duergo) STRP Committees, STRP Community
Facilitators. Community members will be the ones to actually set up
their marine conservation areas and eventually sign conservation
deeds.

We have heard personally from leaders and people in coastal village
who know in their hearts that they have to do something about the
decline, not only in the number of sea turtles frequenting their
beaches, but also the decline in the entire fisheries resources. They
are beginning to realize that they themselves had been and still are
one of the causes of the decreasing fish stocks (and sea turtles).
They also know that outside interests such as commercial fishing, sea
bed mining, sea tailings disposal will also impact their marine
environment.
Our goal is getting them through a process to think and work out what
they can do to address this issue and to develop actions plans to move
forward. Our effort has seen Karkum village in Madang, established its
locally managed marine area using conservation deed in 2008 (Please
see the media article).

COMMUNITY OUTREACH:
In 2007, we developed and facilitated a yearlong series of
conservation deed training workshops in villages along the north coast
of Papua New Guinea.

We worked closely with community partners to hold trainings and
community development activities for a total of 8 villages
representing approximately 3,500 people. Through this process, the
communities came together for workshops in sea turtle and marine
resource protection identify conservation measures to which they will
choose in exchange for support of community needs, such as health
centers and books for libraries and other social and infrastructure
developments. Additionally, the communities have requested help in
fighting the threat of deep-sea mining. As the conservation deed
process continues, we are providing assistance and consultation to
villagers on the best way to address these threats.

We have developed a core group of activist volunteers to assist with
the conservation deed process and other efforts in the region. The
volunteers in several communities are now conducting land and
marine-based resource surveys to provide detailed parameters for
developing conservation deeds. Village leaders and volunteers, as well
as individual resource owners, are highly interested in moving the
conservation deed process forward. We have continued to conduct
resource awareness seminars, surveys, and deed development into 2008.

Concurrent with the work to gain community support for immediate sea
turtle protections, we are building awareness of the impacts on
coastal villages of sea bed mining, sea tailings disposal, commercial
fishing, pollution and related issues. We are also working to educate
governmental leaders, university professors, urban professionals and
others in the nation about the financial and environmental impacts of
these issues. This year we are working to further engage these groups
and individuals in preparing an international call to protect PNG
waters from sea bed mining.

Contact
For further information and queries please do not hesitate to contact
Mr. Wenceslaus Magun on telephone number digicel 719 59665
or email: magun.wences@gmail.com.

We can supply further information should you require them.

For further recommendation of our efforts please contact the Education
Officer for Mahonia Na Dari, Ms Adolphina Luvongit on:
adolph.luvongit@gmail.com or Damien Ase on daseari2@yahoo.com

Yours sincerely,

WENCESLAUS MAGUN
The National Coordinator