Marine Atlas: Maximizing Benefits for Solomon Islands

CONCLUSION

Solomon Islands’ vast ocean is blessed with a myriad of valuable marine resources. The Government of Solomon Islands is strongly committed to successfully conserving and managing these resources through holistic planning and effective management, which will enable the country to maximize the resources’ benefits.

Through identifying, planning and managing the values and benefits of its coastal and ma- rine systems, Solomon Islands can achieve its vision for “a healthy, secure, clean and productive ocean which benefits the people of the Solomon Islands and beyond”. As part of its integrated ocean governance, Solo- mon Islands is aiming to develop a national Marine Spatial Plan using a participatory and inclusive approach to ensure nationwide ownership of the final plan. Stakeholders throughout the Solomon Islands are therefore working together to achieve a healthy, resil- ient and biodiverse ocean for all.

We thank everyone who participated in meetings regarding this atlas and who, through their involvement, contributed input, guidance, data and/or information to this atlas and identified its utility to pol- icy and decision-making (see list of data providers listed in the References). In particular we thank the Solomon Is- lands Ministry of Environment, Climate Change, Disaster Management and Meteorology and the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources, Solomon Islands Bureau of Statistics and other relevant

ministries for providing data and support to the project.

We are grateful for the contributions of text and graphical elements from the Ocean Atlas 2017 of the Heinrich Böll Foundation to this atlas. We also thank the professionals of the MACBIO team, in alphabetical order, Riibeta Abeta, Jasha Dehm, Marian Gauna, Jimaima Le Grand, Vatu Molisa, Eileen Motua, Jan Steffen, Jonah Sullivan and Naushad Yakub for their support, as well as the GRID-Aren- dal team: Kaja Lønne Fjærtoft, Georgios Fylakis, Elsa Lindeval, Petter Sevaldsen and Janet Fernandez Skaalvik.

While the atlas provides the best data currently publicly available, the information about Solomon Islands’ waters is constantly increasing. In this way, the atlas is an open invitation to use, modify, combine and up- date the maps and underlying data. The e-copy and interactive version of the Solomon Islands Marine Atlas are availa- ble here: http://macbio-pacific.info/ marine-atlas

Solomon Islands’ work on integrated ocean governance has been guided by the Ocean12 and the Ocean12 Techni- cal Working Group of the Government of Solomon Islands, with particular support from the committee’s chairs: the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources, the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change, Disaster Management and Meteorology and the Office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.

MARINE ATLAS • MAXIMIZING BENEFITS FOR SOLOMON ISLANDS

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