Experts have gathered for the first Oceania Seabird Symposium in Aotearoa this week, a three-day event convening at the University of Auckland and organised by the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP).
It brought scientists, practitioners and officials from the Programme's 26 member countries together to discuss "guardians of our oceans", University of Auckland Pacific Pro Vice-Chancellor Professor Jemaima Tiatia-Siau said, protection of the birds and their habitats among still largely unknown risks.
"To have an event dedicated to one of the guardians of our oceans – our seabirds, is an important milestone. Across the vast Pacific, seabirds have long been more than just creatures of the sea and sky," Professor Tiatia-Siau said.
"They are carriers of ancestral knowledge, navigators of weather and ocean currents, and messengers that connect our islands to one another and to the wider world.
"Seabirds are part of our identity as peoples of the Pacific, and with our expertise and connections throughout Pacific communities, we can find solutions to protect seabirds and their habitats."
Established in 1993, and headquartered in Samoa with offices around Pasifika nations, SPREP is tasked with Pacific environmental and natural resource management with a mandate to 'protect and improve its environment and to ensure sustainable development for present and future generations'.
The Programme has an existing action plan for seabirds.
SPREP Deputy Director General, Easter Catherine Chu Shing, said the symposium, among knowledge sharing, was about creating a network from within a group of experts passionate about their work, linking scientific and traditional knowledge to "better understand the situation of seabirds".
"Not much is known about the great threats to seabirds... the idea was to give it more focus and attention, and bring awareness to it. We wanted to look at what's been done across the region, in other places like Australia and New Zealand, and by different organisations so that we could all share and learn from one another," she said.
"Seabirds are part of our environment, they are part of nature. They are us as well in many ways".
Future meetings among SPREP members are planned in the future.
