Small Island Developing States (SIDS) in the Pacific, including their industrialized and richest neighbours - Australia and New Zealand - take great pride in their rich biodiversity. For the Pacific SIDS, biodiversity is not only an environmental and cultural asset, but also a fundamental part of economic and sustainable development.

The rich marine life is central to the economically important fisheries and tourism sectors. Indigenous food trees such as coconuts, pandanus, breadfruit and canarium are harvested not only for food, they are also vital for resistance and resilience against sea level rise and other climate change-induced disasters. Livestock and crop farming in the Pacific is also essential – farmers rely on agricultural practices to ensure there is sufficient food supplies and commercially address educational, social and other commitments.  Increasingly interconnected global trade continues to facilitate the wider movement of people as well as export and import of goods through aircraft and shipping vessels, which threatens biodiversity, human populations (including directly through zoonotic diseases) and farmers’ livelihoods in the Pacific islands. Emerging and/or re-emerging biosecurity threats include a host of known and unknown pests and diseases, as well as antimicrobial resistant (AMR) microbes.

Whilst movement of pests and diseases is a global phenomenon, the Pacific Island nations and other SIDS are uniquely vulnerable to invasive species partly because of their fragile ecosystems oftentimes triggered by climate change-related extreme weather events. For example, the impacts of the January 2022 volcanic ash fall in Tonga would likely be exacerbated by a rhinoceros beetle attack on coconut plantations. The same applies to the combined impacts and interactions of cyclones, transboundary animal diseases (TAD) and AMR on livestock. What is more disconcerting for Pacific SIDS in the face of these complex threats is that their national biosecurity capacities are weak in terms of human and other physical resources.

This subprogramme will deliver national capacity building following an integrated One Healthy (OH) approach across primary production, environment and health sectors, and draw on Australian biosecurity expertise, especially in the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment. The South-South and Triangular cooperation mechanism that allows Pacific SIDS to benefit more from Australia’s biosecurity expertise is a major contributor of sustainability for this subprogramme.

The overall objective of this subprogramme is to improve national biosecurity for resilient and sustainable agrifood systems in the Pacific.  The subprogramme will establish and support capacities of national One Health networks and assist them in their preparedness and response planning against transboundary animal and plant pest and disease, invasive species and preventing and combating emerging and re-emerging resistant microbes. One Health networks would be comprised of experts or nominated representatives from agriculture, livestock, biosecurity, disaster management, climate change, public health, farmers and others deemed relevant. The network will enhance governments’ efforts in improving biosecurity to reduce threats to agriculture production.

CHALLENGES AND LESSONS LEARNED

Continuous changes in government and high staff turnover represent a risk of losing committed staff supporting implementation of the subprogramme and the loss of knowledge that is shared with or by relevant institutions.

Overall, none of the subprogramme activities carries any particular risk for causing negative environmental and social impacts. In fact, the subprogramme activities will extremely have positive environmental and social impacts.