SYDNEY, Australia\u2014Representatives of 12 Pacific Island countries are meeting in Sydney this week with maritime experts from Australia and the Pacific Community to negotiate maritime boundary agreements and refine their claims to areas of continental shelf.<\/p>\n
Pacific Island countries have limited land areas but vast space entitlements in the Pacific Ocean, leading Pacific leaders to coin the phrase \u201cLarge Ocean Island States.\u201d<\/p>\n
Delimiting maritime zones is an important process for countries to secure their rights over ocean space and marine resources, including fisheries and seabed minerals.<\/p>\n
The hands-on workshop will enable the technical and legal teams from each country to work with a group of advisers from SPC, Geoscience Australia, the University of Sydney, the Australian Attorney-General\u2019s Department, the Commonwealth Secretariat, GRID-Arendal and the Forum Fisheries Agency.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis workshop will assist Pacific Island states to establish their full entitlements to maritime zones in accordance with the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea and review their maritime zones legislation,\u201d the manager of Oceans and Coastal Geoscience for the Pacific Community, Jens Kruger, said.<\/p>\n
\u201cTwo claims to areas of extended continental shelf are currently being considered by the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf, with another seven in the queue. Four Pacific countries have enacted new maritime zones legislation, and six states have submitted information on the limits of their maritime zones with the UN.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Pacific is really leading the world in this area,\u201d Professor Elaine Baker, chair of Marine Science at the University of Sydney, noted. \u201cHaving established their maritime entitlements, many of the country teams are now developing the tools to manage their marine spaces effectively.\u00a0 This is something that many developed countries are only just beginning to grapple with.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is the 14th maritime boundaries workshop SPC has held for Pacific Island countries since 2002, in conjunction with a range of other experts.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe workshops have enabled Tuvalu to conclude our maritime boundary agreements with our neighbors and to declare the limits of each of our maritime zones,\u201d Tuvalu\u2019s Director of Lands and Survey and Chair of the Pacific Geospatial and Surveying Council, Faatasi Malaloga, said. \u201cWe can now focus on the management of Tuvalu\u2019s marine resources.\u201d<\/p>\n
These workshops continue to be funded by the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. This workshop is the latest example of the technical cooperation between SPC and the Government of Australia and demonstrates Australia\u2019s ongoing commitment to achieving sustainable development results that make a difference to the lives of Pacific Island people. (SPC)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" SYDNEY, Australia\u2014Representatives of 12 Pacific Island countries are meeting in Sydney this week with maritime…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[8579,4690,389,2101],"class_list":["post-216109","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-australia-representatives","tag-pacific-community","tag-pacific-islands","tag-tuvalu"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216109"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216109\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}