Losing Nemo & gaining weight

"The ocean is like a checking account where everybody withdraws but nobody makes a deposit. This is what's happening because of overfishing" Enric Sala, National Geographic explorer

Term has finished, Christmas holidays have started, yet I still have copious amounts of work and the uphill battle for decent night's sleep continues. In today's post, I thought I would combine my previous posts to highlight a serious problem in the Pacific Islands; Food security.

Figure 1: Cartoon depicting one of the oceans modern day problems - Source: Seppo Leinonen 

Climate change across the Pacific Islands is very detrimental to the regions food supply and a dramatic shift has been identified from traditional diets to more refined factory-made foods. This is exacerbated by the Pacific islands facing a two-fold development dilemma, meeting national development goals, whilst protecting the environment.

What has caused this shift?

1.  Increasing global temperatures has resulted in coral reef degradation through coral bleaching and ocean acidification which has affected fish populations, particularly reef fish, as coral reefs are now unable to supply the 35kg of fish per year needed for good nutrition.

Video 1: Explains the coral bleaching process and effects

Video 2: Explains ocean acidification and its consequences

2. Rising sea levels have caused extreme weather events affecting agriculture tremendously, by reducing the amount of land available for agriculture. This has forced people away from local grown food towards a reliance on imported produce.

3. Overfishing has reduced fish stocks in the Pacific forcing islanders to adapt from traditional fish dominated diets.  Pacific tuna fisheries alone are worth approximately $4.1 billion USD annually, adding significantly to the regions GDP, highlighting its importance regarding regional development. 

Figure 2: Check out the Global Fishing Watch to view all of the fishing boat activity for the previous year (It's pretty cool!)

4. Warming oceans have caused a change in the demographics of the regions fisheries creating smaller equatorial fisheries

Figure 3: Warming oceans are reshaping fisheries as marine species are gradually moving from equatorial regions towards cooler sub equatorial waters - Source: Chueng, Watson and Pauly 2013

The consequences

1. The transition from traditional diets to imported refined fast food diets has resulted in an obesity epidemic within the region. Simultaneously causing other health implications including non-communicable diseases (NCD).

Figure 4: Top 10 most obese nations in the world, 9 of which are Pacific Islands - Source: Clinic Compare

Figure 5: Obesity of other nations in the world for a comparison - Source: Clinic Compare

Obesity has been cited as the main reason behind the rise in diabetes in the region. 

Figure 6: Diabetes in the Pacific Islands - Source: International Diabetes Federation Diabetes Atlas 

Video 3: Video highlighting the obesity epidemic in the Cook Islands and what the nation is doing about the problem

NCD's are a serious threat to the region accounting for 60-80% of all deaths. Nations such as Palau suffer from other NCD's including cardiovascular disease and chronic respiratory disease as a result of obesity.

Mitigation techniques

1. The development of marine reserves are used to sustainably develop fisheries in a controlled way, whilst supporting other marine biodiversity.

Video 4: The nation of Niue in the South Pacific recently established the largest marine protected area ever, this vide explains the reasons behind it.

Figure 7: Map displaying the world's largest marine reserve in Niue encompassing 127,869 sqkm - Source: UNDP

2.  Banning commercial fishing and restricted specific fishing equipment in there waters to help sustainably rejuvenate fisheries.

Video 5: Video talking about Kiribati's decision to ban fishing in the Phoenix Islands protected area to help protect global tuna stocks

Figure 8: A schematic displaying sea cucumber management in the Pacific - Source: Purcell, Lovatelli, Pakoa, 2014

3. Pacific Islands have identified fishery management as a productive way to improve their fish stocks particularly in rural areas

Video 6: Video on community based fisheries management in the Solomon Islands and how successful implementing management schemes such as Fish Aggregating devices and Marine Protected areas have been there.

4.  Increasing taxes on sugary imports and applied tariffs to healthier foods to encourage natives to source local products.

The future 

Pristine Seas is the largest environmental preservation project run by the National Geographic. It aims to protect and manage marine environments in a sustainable way.

Video 7: Video highlighting the exceptional work by Pristine Seas has done

Overall this post explains how climate change is having a detrimental effect on the health of Islanders, highlighting how it effects far more than just the environment and how numerous problems are intertwined.


Wells