Strategies in place to protect marine habitat, says expert environment

By GRACE AUKA
THERE are strategies in place to improve the contribution of communities towards protecting the marine environment and sustaining the resources they extract from it but realistic implementation has not been successful yet, an environmentalist says.
Speaking during a learning and training workshop in Port Moresby yesterday, Vagi Rei from the Department of Environment and Conservation encouraged participants to comply with strategies on the marine programme.
“As landowners and resources owners, you have to think about the impact you will have on the communities and their contribution to implement the marine programme,” he said.
He said the marine programme’s five goals were mainly focused on seascape, ecosystem approach to fisheries management; marine protected areas, climate change and threatened species.
“This is because the successful implementation of the five goals is dependent on the success of the communities to conserve and manage the marine environment,” he said.
“We cannot implement the five goals without the communities.”
Rei said communities owned and had user rights of the reefs and the species that lived in it.
“They must therefore be part of any protection and management the government and non-government organisations and its partners initiate,” he said.
“I strongly believe the learning and training network is moving in the right direction to encourage learning and sharing successful approaches in community conservation and resource management,” he said. 
He said a society could not be smart and wise if it could not manage the marine environment and a society could not be fair if knowledge and experiences were not shared.
He said the three-day workshop was going to make a significant contribution to coastal and island communities to be a smart, wise, fair and happy society by 2050.
The workshop ends tomorrow.
Participants attending it are representatives from coastal communities in provinces such as Madang, Milne Bay, Manus and Central.