East Melanesian Islands

Biodiversity
Flagshipspecies
Threats
Conservation

Although it was not previously identified as a biodiversity hotspot, this region's accelerating habitat loss and additional research done there have led to the identification of the group of East Melanesian islands northeast and east of New Guinea as requiring hotspot status. This assemblage of great tropical oceanic islands is without parallel in its combination of insular biodiversity, unique environment, and amazingly rich diversity of traditional cultures.

The East Melanesian Islands Hotspot encompasses the islands of the Bismarck Archipelago, the Solomon chain, the Santa Cruz Islands (Temotu), and the islands of Vanuatu. Politically, this includes the northeastern insular portion of Papua New Guinea (including the large islands of New Britain, New Ireland, and Manus); Buka and Bougainville, which are at the northern end of the Solomon chain, but politically part of Papua New Guinea; and the entirety of the nations of the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. These islands are little known because of their inaccessibility and because they lie within the considerable shadow cast by the subcontinental island of New Guinea —the great biodiversity generator of the tropical Pacific. Being truly oceanic, the islands of the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot are relatively species-poor when compared to the biotic riches of New Guinea. However, when compared to other tropical Pacific island groups or any other islands of comparable size, they are the most diverse physiographically, biotically, and ethnically.

Lying directly on the Pacific “Ring of Fire” strings of active volcanoes erupt periodically, shaking the earth and sending plumes of ash over the surrounding landscape. Rabaul City, capital of East New Britain Province, was destroyed by the eruption of Tavurvur in August, 1994. The island of Tanna in Vanuatu also has an active volcano, which is famed for being the world's most accessible. Rough and rocky coastlines are found along many shore areas, while in other parts, mangroves or fringing coral reefs are more typical. This inaccessibility has hindered development and commerce. The region's reef ecosystem diversity is high, containing some of the most pristine reefs on Earth. The region's rainforests look much like those found on New Guinea, and many of New Guinea's common forest trees are also found dominating the forests of this hotspot.

The oceanic island arcs of this hotspot are a mixture of young volcanics and very old basement rocks that date back to the Cretaceous, the same geological period in which New Zealand and New Caledonia were drifting away from the disintegrating Gondwanaland. Thus, while the hotspot contains classic examples of relatively recent adaptive radiation typical of oceanic islands, such as the white-eyes (family Zosteropidae) and monarch flycatchers (family Monarchidae), it also carries some odd colonizers from times past such as the giant monkey-tailed skink of the genus Corucia, whose closest living relatives are the blue-tongued skinks (genus Tiliqua) of Australia, New Guinea, and Indonesia; and the giant Placostylus land snails shared with the Gondwanaland fragments of Australia, New Caledonia, New Zealand, and also with Fiji. The East Melanesian Islands Hotspot has affinities with Fiji (included as part of the Polynesia-Micronesia Hotspot, but which probably sits better culturally within Melanesia), such as Platymantis frogs, ancient “monkey-faced” fruit bats of the genus Pteralopex, and Nesoclopeus rails —all of which trace back to colonization in a distant archipelagic past shared with Fiji.

The East Melanesian Islands Hotspot is one of the most geographically complex areas on Earth. Intricate tectonic plate movements have produced a mix of colliding and subducting plates, which, in turn, have generated deep oceanic trenches and affiliated strings of islands of varying age and development. At the top of the hotspot, at 2°S latitude, lies the Bismarck Archipelago's Admiralty group, dominated by Manus Island (1 834 km²), which is surrounded by a constellation of small islands, the largest of which are Rambutyo and Lou. Northeast of the Admiralties lies the Saint Matthias Group; the largest, Mussau (or St. Matthias; 414 km²) stands as the head of a chain of small island groups (Tabar, Lihir, Tanga, Feni, and Nissan) that lead southeastward to Buka and Bougainville, in the Solomon chain.

The two main islands of the Bismarck Archipelago—New Ireland (7 174 km²) and New Britain (35 742 km²)— lie south and southwest of the Tabar-Nissan islands string. Both islands are complex and mountainous, with peaks exceeding 2 000 m. Just west of the northern tip of New Ireland lies New Hanover (1 186 km²), while north and west of New Britain one finds several island outliers—the Witu Islands, Siassi Islands (including Umboi), and Long and Crown in the extreme west, just north of the coast of mainland Papua New Guinea. The island chain that includes Long and Umboi arcs northwestward off the coast of New Guinea and comprises a series of recent volcanoes, some still active.

Mountainous Bougainville, the largest in the Solomon chain, covers 8 591 km² and supports several high massifs (some volcanic), the highest of which, Mount Balbi, stands 2 685 m above sea level, the high point of the hotspot. Together with Buka (611 km²), the northernmost of the Solomon group, these two islands were part of the German New Guinea colonial administration, and are today part of Papua New Guinea. The remainder of the Solomons constitutes the independent nation of the Solomon Islands (a former British protectorate). Together they comprise two parallel chains of large islands. The northern chain includes (from west to east): Choiseul, Santa Isabel, and Malaita, while the southern chain comprises Vella Lavella, Kolombangara, New Georgia and Rendova, the Russell Islands, Guadalcanal, and Makira. Isolated Rennell Island (684 km²), one of the most remarkable and unique islands in the region, lies some 175 km to the south of Guadalcanal; this island is home to the largest freshwater lake in the insular Pacific (Lake Tegano). Most isolated of all in this island nation are the Santa Cruz Islands, 375 km east of Makira and dominated by Nendo, Tinakula, Utupua, and Vanikoro. These lie at the top of the hotspot's easternmost island chain that leads south to Vanuatu (another legacy of nineteenth-century colonialism, the Solomons being a British protectorate and Vanuatu being a French-British Condominium of the New Hebrides, referred to in history texts as the “Pandemonium”).

The diverse islands of Vanuatu (formerly the New Hebrides) lie almost 300 km south-southeast from the Temotu group. Geographically, Vanuatu resembles the Solomons, but has smaller, lower, younger islands. To the north lie the Banks and Torres Islands, followed by a double chain of large islands (Espiritu Santo and Malakula to the west; Maewo, Pentecost, Ambrym, and Efate to the east). Below Efate, a single chain of smaller islands appears: Erromango, Tanna, and Anatom.

Thus, this insular hotspot supports in excess of 1 600 islands, encompassing a land area of around 99 384 km². Although a tiny area in global terms, the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot has more land than all of the remaining islands in the tropical Pacific, being a little more than double the land area encompassed in the Polynesia-Micronesia Hotspot (ca. 47 000 km²).

The geological history of these island groups is very complex and poorly known. Most of their history seems to be recent, these groups being of Late Tertiary emergence from the sea. The major formative events, however, relate to the break-up of Gondwana, the rafting of the Indo-Australian Plate northward, and its long contact and interaction with the Pacific Plate and several smaller plates (South Bismarck Plate, Solomon Sea Plate). The Indo-Australian and Pacific plates are currently converging at a rate of 12 cm/yr (Honza et al. 1987). One finds the development of island arcs in association with a single long and sinuous subduction zone that has created a series of 7 000-m deep-sea trenches.

In essence, there has been a substantial tectonic interaction between what has been characterized as the West Melanesia Arc and the New Guinea/Australia craton, and it is this interaction that has apparently produced all of the island chains and groups mentioned above. A close examination of a bathymetric map shows a series of trenches and deeps that arc from the southern verge of New Britain east and southeastward along the southern verge of the Solomons and southeastward along the western verge of the islands of Vanuatu. In addition, an examination of island patterns displayed in relation to this deep water is that two or even three chains of islands are arrayed in parallel along this Melanesian arc. It perhaps shows up most clearly in the vicinity of New Ireland and Bougainville, where one can find a line of high, massive islands, a smaller set of rugged islands (e.g., Feni, Lihir), and finally a low set of atolls (e.g., Lyra Reef, Nuguria Islands, Carteret Islands); one can also see this in the Solomons (especially the New Georgia Group, Choiseul, Ontong Java Atoll). The pattern is only broken by the oddball positioning of New Britain and its affiliated islands to the west —a product of little-understood actions of the two Bismarck microplates in contact with the Indo-Australian Plate.

The islands of this hotspot have never been in land contact with New Guinea, and the current 100-km-long Vitiaz Strait separating New Guinea from New Britain was formerly a much broader ocean channel. As a result, the biotas of these islands are a mix of long-distance immigrants and older indigenous lineages derived from ancient Pacific-Gondwanan stock. Given the uncertain above-sea histories of these islands, one might presume that the more ancient lineages survived by hopping from island group to island group as they periodically arose, submerged, and arose anew.

In terms of climate, the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot is composed of small and large, low and high islands that are uniformly tropical and humid. All receive in excess of 1 500 mm of rain per year, and the wetter sites receive in excess of 5 000 mm per year. The Weather Coast of the main Solomon Islands (especially on Makira and Guadalcanal) receives huge amounts of rain, as do regions in southern New Britain (Gasmata receives 6 m; Pomio, 6.5 m). The entire hotspot lies south of the Equator, from 2°S to 20°S and, therefore, is located wholly within the tropics. In addition, southernmost Vanuatu exhibits a cool and dry season from May to October. One major climatic feature that varies from west to east is susceptibility to cyclones during the December to March season. The eastern Solomons and all of Vanuatu lie on the cyclone track, and those forests most exposed have suffered the repeated devastation of high winds. In the Solomon Islands, there are tall gallery forests in Western Province, while on Makira Island to the east, which suffers regular cyclone damage, the forest is more like a natural mosaic of secondary successions.

This hotspot is culturally and linguistically very rich. Vanuatu, with 109 living traditional languages, has more languages per unit area than any nation on Earth. The Solomon Islands, with 74 languages, is only slightly less diverse. With such a large number of languages over a small population, it is not surprising that there are many languages with only a few hundred speakers. Languages are dying or mixing into “Pijin-Austronesian Creoles” in the Melanesian Islands. The disappearance of linguistic diversity results in a rapid loss of traditional knowledge and traditional practice. Typically, this leads to erosion of traditional links between communities and the forests that have long served as their primary source of wealth and subsistence. However, a shift to the modern cash economy is the underlying force behind the rise in destructive exploitation of the region's natural environments.

Mueller-Dombois and Fosberg (1998) delineated a series of natural vegetation types in the Solomon Islands, and these typify the region as a whole: coastal strand vegetation; mangrove forest; freshwater swamp forest; lowland rainforest; seasonally dry forest and grassland; and montane rainforest. Most are species-poor, with several tree species dominating (the dominants varying from site to site and island to island). In certain sites, single tree species dominate, as with the monodominant stands of Campnosperma brevipetiolata and Terminalia brassi in swamps (Johns 1993). Recent studies by Bayliss-Smith et al. (2003) indicate that many “oldgrowth” forests in the Solomons are secondary and show the impacts of past human disturbance. This fact probably applies to most or all of the lowland and hill forests of the hotspot.

Based on the analysis of Mueller-Dombois and Fosberg (1998), Wikramanayake et al. (2002) summarized the floristics of forest habitats in the various ecoregions of the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot. The Bismarck Archipelago is characterized by a range of typical species and genera of forest trees that are well known in New Guinea, and mentioned above, but certain taxa are conspicuously absent. The genus Araucaria, an emergent conifer of ancient Gondwanic origins, does not occur in the hotspot, though its relative Agathis occurs throughout. Nothofagus, another Gondwanan relict so important in montane New Guinea, is found at relatively low altitudes in the mountains of New Britain, but absent on New Ireland and the Solomons, where the highlands are locally dominated by Metrosideros salmomonis. The Dipterocarpaceae, which dominate in Southeast Asia and are rather common in New Guinea, are essentially absent from the hotspot. Overall, the region's forest flora is poor compared to that of New Guinea, with dominant trees being Pometia, Dillenia, Elaeocarpus, Endospermum, Campnosperma, Calophyllum, Terminalia, Canarium, Agathis, Metrosideros, and Sararanga. All of these genera are found on mainland New Guinea.

In total, the vascular plant flora of the region is estimated to be 8 000 species, and of these some 3 5004 000 species are thought to be endemic to the region (D. Frodin, pers. comm.). The fauna of the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot is an attenuated sample of that from New Guinea, plus a minor but distinctive oceanic element. Certain groups (for example, birds of paradise, bowerbirds, scrub-wrens, tree-kangaroos, echidnas, gliders) that are prominent on mainland New Guinea are absent from this insular hotspot. Other taxa (honeyeaters, white-eyes, monarchs, fantails, flying foxes and allies, and murid rodents) abound on the islands. Finally, certain sylviine warbler lineages, and certain gecko and frog lineages are more prominent on these islands, but rare or absent on mainland New Guinea. Because of different regimes of oceanic isolation and local adaptive radiation, endemism is very high on the islands, with some species endemic to the hotspot, others endemic to subsets of the hotspot, and yet others confined to single islands. The insular and fragmented nature of species ranges also leads to high levels of endangerment.

The hotspot supports 365 regularly occurring bird species, 154 of which are endemic. Compositionally, the avifauna is distinct from that of New Guinea, and has seven endemic genera (Microgoura, Nesasio, Woodfordia, Guadalcanaria, Stresemannia, Mayrornis, and Neolalage). The hotspot also includes six Endemic Bird Areas (EBAs), as defined by BirdLife International (Stattersfield et al. 1998): the Admiralty Islands, with six species confined entirely to this EBA; St. Matthias Island (two species); New Britain and New Ireland (35 species); the Solomon group, with a staggering 61 species endemic; Rennell and Bellona (five species); and Vanuatu and Temotu (15 species).

The region holds a varied mammal fauna, but can be characterized as poor in nonvolant species and rich in volant species (bats). Flying foxes and allies (Pteropodidae) and Microchiroptera occur in almost equal diversity, with 36 and 33 species, respectively. In total, of the 86 mammal species native to the hotspot, 39 are endemic. There are three endemic genera: Anthops, with a single species, the flower-faced bat (A. ornatus, VU);Melonycteris (three species); and Solomys (three species).

A total of 114 species of reptiles (54 endemic) and 44 species of amphibians (38 endemic) are known to occur in this hotspot. The region is home to six endemic genera of reptiles, five of which are represented by single species, including four species of snake —Bothrochilus boa, Loveridgelaps elapoides, Parapistocalamus hedigeri, and Salomonelaps par— and a lizard, Corucia zebrata. The sixth endemic genus, Geomyersia, consists of two species of lizards. There are also four endemic genera of amphibians; two of the amphibian genera are monotypic, namely Palmatorappia solomonis (VU), a species from the Solomon Islands that may actually represent two species, and Ceratobatrachus guentheri, found on the Solomon Islands and Bougainville and Buka islands. It is perhaps not surprising that the herpetofauna of this hotspot is rather impoverished, given its physical isolation. However, there is interesting within-region variation in this pattern. For example, there are 40 species of lizards from Bougainville (many endemic), but only 26 and 30 species recorded from New Ireland and New Britain, respectively (Allison 2001). New Ireland is indicative of the herpetofauna of a large island in the region. Allison's catalog for New Ireland includes the following families (with species numbers in parentheses): Amphibia: Hylidae (2), Ranidae (5); Reptilia: Crocodylidae (1), Agamidae (2), Gekkonidae (6), Scincidae (19), Varanidae (2), Boidae (2), Pythonidae (2), Colubridae (4), Elapidae (1), Laticaudidae (1), Typhlopidae (3). Thus, it is a hotspot typified by skinks and geckos. It is also notable that both the boas and the pythons co-occur in this hotspot.

The hotspot supports a small but highly unique freshwater ichthyofauna, and includes families such as Eleotridae, Gobiidae, and Mugilidae. Until recently, there has not been a concerted effort to catalogue the freshwater ichthyofauna inhabiting the South Pacific. However, conservation groups like the Wildlife Conservation Society, Wetlands International, and Conservation International, as well as several academic institutions, are now beginning to document the region's freshwater biota.

It is estimated that there are approximately 52 species of freshwater fishes throughout the hotspot and, of those, three species are considered endemic: Stenogobius alleni, found on New Britain Island in Papua New Guinea;S. hoesei, found throughout the Admiralty and Solomon Islands and the Bismarck Archipelago; and Stiphodon astilbos, found in Vanuatu. The number of taxa decreases further inland from the ocean and as altitude increases, with gobioid fishes likely being the only native taxonomic group observed once a precipitous obstruction has broken the continuity of a stream. Because the fishes inhabiting the hotspot are of marine origin, diadromous behavior is not uncommon and all the freshwater fishes are capable of tolerating a wide range of saltwater concentrations. These factors have helped create the distinct fish faunal assemblage for this region.

The invertebrate fauna is poorly known. As with the other life-forms, the invertebrate faunas of each more distant island group are ever more attenuated subsets of that from the source island of New Guinea. Butterflies are relatively well known among arthropods. The Ornithoptera (birdwing) butterflies find their center of species richness in New Guinea. The genus ranges eastward through the Bismarcks to the Solomons, where three species are found (O. allotae, O. urvillianus, and O. victoriae). By contrast, the papilionid genus Troides (sensu stricto) is widespread in the Moluccas and New Guinea, but absent from the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot. The blue emperor swallowtail (Papilio ulysses), so well known in tropical Queensland, ranges westward to the Moluccas, northward into New Guinea, and is also widespread in the Bismarcks and Solomons, but does not reach Vanuatu (D'Abrera 1990).

While not necessarily a center for typical flagship species, the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot has its share of unusual creatures and plants, all of which merit attention and conservation. The Kauri pine (Agathis spp.) is perhaps the most logical selection as a plant flagship. This ancient Gondwanan conifer is the largest tree in the islands, and is an important timber species. It grows to a huge girth, and makes for a remarkable forest where it is common. Foresters, of course, lust after it, and it tends to be high-graded out of forests wherever it is found.

Besides bird species such as the superb pitta (Pitta superba, VU) of Manus Island, perhaps the most beautiful species in the hotspot (although one that is very difficult to see), and the fearful owl (Nesasio solomonenis, VU), a Solomon Islands endemic and the hotspot's largest nightbird, the most majestic avian flagship is the Solomons sea-eagle (Haliaeetus sanfordi, VU), another Solomons endemic. This species favors coastal forests, but pairs also hunt further inland and, at least on the eastern islands, they appear to have entirely inland ranges where they prey largely on northern common cuscus (Phalanger orientalis) and fruit bats. Among flagship mammals, the most remarkable are the flying foxes, which are known to play an important role in pollination and seed dispersal of plants. Of the 13 threatened species of pteropid bats recorded from the hotspot, three are Critically Endangered and poorly known, but highlighted here to draw attention to their plight: the Bougainville monkey-faced bat (Pteralopex anceps) was known mainly from specimens collected in the 1920s, until six bats were observed during a 1995 survey (and apparently no sign of this bat was found during fieldwork on Choiseul in 1992 or on Buka in 1997); the montane monkey-faced bat (P. pulchra) is known from only a single specimen collected on Mt. Makarakomburu on Guadalcanal; and the Guadalcanal monkey-faced bat (P. atrata) was last recorded in 1991, although there has been limited survey work in its likely range. Besides the flying foxes, the Admiralty cuscus (Spilocuscus kraemeri) is the only endemic cuscus in the hotspot, being confined to the Admiralty Islands; this beautifully patterned brown, black, and white species is a popular game animal on Manus.

Other flagship species in the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot include the Solomons prehensile-tailed skink (Corucia zebrata), a very large, arboreal skink that feeds primarily on the leaves of epiphytes (McCoy 1980), and the two birdwing butterflies, Ornithoptera allotae and O. victoriae. The latter two species are large, prominent, and spectacular, and depend upon specialized food plants for their reproduction. In addition, the marvelous green tree snail of Manus Island, Papustyla pulcherrima, is another good flagship. It is collected and widely appreciated throughout the region and globally.

Until the 1970s, the region supported relatively intact lowland forests in abundance. The clearance and degradation of these over the past three decades is a prime reason why the region is now being classified as a hotspot. Today, less than 25% of the region's lowland forests remain as “old growth,” primarily in the least accessible areas, especially in places where local communities have resisted the siren's song of the foreign logging companies. Upland humid forests remain in better condition, but with population growth even these are being reduced, primarily by clearance for subsistence gardens.

Given the insular environment and absence of large expanses of contiguous habitat, oceanic island biodiversity is vulnerable to threats in many ways. The islands of the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot have remained pristine longer than more accessible island groups, but over the last decade virtually all of the negative impacts that we know for those other island groups have come to the region. Industrial-scale logging, conversion of forest for monoculture plantations, exotic invasive species, and clearance of habitat by expanding human populations have all taken their toll on this region. In addition, it is common for village inhabitants to engage in habitual burning of vegetation. These burning practices cause gradual erosion of the forest frontier and lead to soil erosion, which consequently intensifies sedimentation in streambeds.

By comparing remote sensing analyses with a finer resolution analysis of logging concessions and oil palm plantations on New Britain and New Ireland, we calculate that the percentage of remaining habitat for the entire East Melanesian Islands is around 39%. We believe this figure is perhaps a generous estimate, though probably close to 2003 conditions, and further it is likely that it includes a considerable amount of secondary forest. In light of this, and given the rapid rate of deforestation in this region, we feel that a reasonable estimate of the extent of remaining primary habitat in the region is around 30%.

The Bismarck Islands have been most heavily impacted by extensive logging of lowland and hill forests and also subsequent clearance of forests for copra and oil palm monocultures near the coast. The plantation impacts are mainly confined to New Britain, whereas logging has taken place widely in the hotspot, wherever there is accessible forest. By contrast, the Admiralties have been most affected by rural agricultural expansion, though logging has had an impact as well.

The Solomon Islands are much like the Bismarcks, but even more vulnerable because of the smaller size of the islands. Logging has had a devastating effect on lowland forests, and copra plantations are also wide-spread. Forest conversion is expected to be particularly important on Makira and New Georgia, and perhaps elsewhere in the Solomons. The extent of impact of exotic invasive species, especially pigs, cats, rats, and little red fire ants, is serious, but poorly studied. Flannery (1995) noted the apparent extirpation of several species of giant rodents from Guadalcanal, apparently caused by cat predation. It is unknown what sort of impact invasives have had in the Bismarcks, but it has probably been serious there as well. An expedition to New Ireland in 1992 found invasives (cane toads and feral cats) in old-growth forest. The invasive fire ant Wasmannia sp. invaded the Solomon Islands in the 1980s and has reached plague levels on many islands today. It has most recently arrived in Vanuatu. In the Solomons, the area under cultivation doubled between 1972 and 1992 (Thistlethwait and Votaw 1992).

The situation in Vanuatu is similar. About 35% of the land of Vanuatu supports some sort of forest cover and logging remains an important economic activity, mainly on Espiritu Santo. Additionally, clearance for plantations and subsistence agriculture is removing the last remnant lowland forests of the nation. Grave pressures on Vanuatu's natural resources are undoubtedly being exacerbated by human population growth. Introduced species, uncontrolled habitual burning of the island's native vegetation, and deteriorating social structures are other threats to biodiversity.

In all of the larger islands of the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot, the rugged highland forests are largely still intact and in good condition, but it remains unclear whether the original native faunas of these montane forests are comparably intact, especially given the threat from invasive species such as pigs, cats, and rats. Mining is a minor threat on the terrestrial side, quite localized to catchment areas where a particular mine is operating (as in Bougainville and Lihir), but offshore impacts from tailing runoff are a major concern.

Another broad-scale and diffuse threat is poor governance and government instability. This leads to inadequate management of resources, poor deals (and poorly managed deals) with international resource development companies (mining and logging in particular), and social and cultural disruption. The Solomon Islands have been the most heavily affected, suffering a constitutional crisis in 2000. Governance troubles that plague Papua New Guinea also impact the Bismarck Islands. A nearly decade-long war on Bougainville was tied to poor management of the large Panguna Copper Mine —especially the Bougainvillean people's perception that they were inflicted with the ill effects of the mine, while reaping too few of the profits. The implications of this little-known war will be felt in Bougainville for decades, and its long-term negative impact on Bougainville's environment should not be underestimated. With poor governance there is a typical tendency to overexploit resources as a quick solution to budgetary shortfalls, which compromises the health and stability of forests, fisheries, and watersheds.

There is little formal protection of land and sea resources in the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot, mainly because the three island nations respect local customary tenure and have had minimal alienation of land or coastal marine territory for creation of governmentmanaged parks and protected areas.

Overall, protected areas coverage in the hotspot is poor. According to the World Database on Protected Areas, there are 24 protected areas covering some 6% of the hotspot, none of which are classified in IUCN categories I to IV, and only eight are included in categories V and VI (these eight protected areas cover only 1% of the hotspot).

What national parks are in place tend to be leftovers from colonial times. The Queen Elizabeth II National Park near the capital Honiara in Solomon Islands, the nation's only National Park, has been completely degraded in the 50 years since it was established in 1954 from primary forest to secondary forest and grassland. In Vanuatu, many natural areas are protected under custom law, but these are rarely of sufficient size for species and habitat protection.

The fundamental constraint on any conservation initiative in the hotspot, particularly one involving the establishment of protected areas, is the customary land tenure system. Unlike the neighboring Melanesian nation of Fiji, where customary title is formally codified, the nations of the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot recognize customary tenure in broad terms, and it is generally left up to a system of land dispute hearings to settle conflicting claims to ownership or usage rights over land. The first basic step in undertaking any conservation initiative, be it protected-area establishment or species-specific actions, is in knowing at that point in time who or where the land-owning community is.

The Human Poverty Index for the islands in this hotspot is the lowest in the Pacific region, and among the lowest in the world (UNDP 1999). Given the lack of clearly defined legal title over land and widespread rural poverty, community-managed protection associated with community development activities is the most common strategy followed for establishing conservation areas, but the results are mixed and highly dependent on the standard of village-level engagement and the level of community cohesiveness and collective decision-making capacity. Sustainable incentives and locally meaningful motivations for rural Melanesian communities to accept a conservation regime over their communally owned resources are necessary, as is objective selection of project sites based on national and global conservation value.

International and local NGOs have been, and continue to be, major players in conservation in the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot, either in formal or informal partnerships with the respective government's conservation offices. The regional conservation and environmental body, SPREP (South Pacific Regional Environment Programme) is a multi-governmental organization which works closely with member governments, including the nations of the East Melanesian Islands Hotspot.

Conservation International and a number of partner institutions have been active in parts of the region for over a decade. CI fieldwork was initiated in partnership with the East New Britain Social Action Committee (ENBSEK) in 1993, focusing on coastal communities in the Wide Bay region of East New Britain, and has resulted in the designation of the Klampun Wildlife Management Area (WMA) in 2003, with the neighboring Tiemtop WMA due for designation in 2004. CI has also been working in the Bauro Highlands of Makira in the Solomons since 1994, in partnership with the Maruia Trust of New Zealand and the Solomon Islands Development Trust (and most recently the Makira Community Conservation Foundation), with a goal to establish a formally recognized conservation area in the Bauro Highlands (60 000 ha).

The Nature Conservancy (TNC) has been active in the Kimbe region of New Britain since 1994 developing a network of locally managed marine protected areas, promoting sustainable development, and encouraging community-based conservation and resource management. In 1996, a cooperative venture between TNC, the European Union, and Walindi Plantation Resort culminated in the establishment of the Mahonia Na Dari Research and Conservation Center —a locally managed non-governmental organization—, which has focused primarily on marine environmental education and awareness related to logging and fishing practices, oil palm plantation development, and human population growth.

Since 1996, the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF), in partnership with the Tetepare Descendants' Association, has been developing the Tetepare Island Community Resource Conservation and Development project in Western Province, Solomon Islands. This initiative is located on the largest uninhabited island in the South Pacific, touted for its natural inheritance and archaeological values.

Finally, SPREP has developed a community-based conservation project in Koromandi, on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands and at Vatthe on Espiritu Santo, Vanuatu. The Koromandi project has led to the creation of a local conservation area of lowland and montane rainforest, while the Vatthe project has focused on conservation of the largest tract of remaining lowland rainforest on Espiritu Santo by means of a communitybased project (Read 2002). Unfortunately, the project was terminated in 2000 due to unrest and ethnic tension in the region.

In general, there is very little large-scale conservation action currently under way in the hotspot, and the region is in urgent need of increased attention and investment from the conservation community.

The habitat protection initiatives to date have just begun to wrestle with the difficulties of conservation on uncodified customary land in the Melanesian cultural and social context. There is still no area that could be called a secure protected area. The greatest successes have come where relationships are built between communities and conservation agencies over time and collaboration is mutually beneficial. Without conservation agencies valuing community needs and aspirations, or the land-owning communities valuing their biodiversity heritage, such collaboration is not possible. The future of the East Melanesian Island Hotspot's biodiversity lies in developing these successful partnerships.

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