Subsistence and commercial fishing, expanding tourism and coastal development are among the stressors facing ecosystems in Micronesia. A miracle in a LITTLE ISLANDS, conference room Kolonia, Federated States of Micronesia — Conservationist BIG STRIDES Bernd Cordes experienced plenty of physical splendor during a ten-day Inspired individuals and Western donors trip to Micronesia in 2017, his first visit to the region in six years. Irides- built a modern conservation movement in cent fish darted out from tropical corals. Wondrous green islands rose Micronesia. But the future of reefs there is from the light blue sea. Manta rays as tenuous as ever. zoomed through the waves off a beach covered in wild coconut trees. But it was inside an overheated By Eli Kintisch conference room on the island of Pohnpei that Cordes witnessed Palau/FSM Profile 1 perhaps the most impressive sight on his trip. There, on the nondescript premises of the Micronesia Con- servation Trust, or MCT, staff from a dozen or so environmental groups operating across the region attended a three-day session led by officials at MCT, which provides $1.5 million each year to these and other groups. Cordes wasn’t interested, per se, in the contents of the discussions. After all, these were the kind of optimistic PowerPoint talks, mixed with sessions on financial reporting and compliance, that you might find at a meeting between a donor and its grantees anywhere in the world. Yet in that banality, for Cordes, lay the triumph. MCT funds projects Most households in the Federated States of Micronesia rely on subsistence fishing. ranging from a shark sanctuary that covers 2.5 million square miles to a and this writer—it was on behalf Our trip focused on two countries network of marine protected areas, of the David and Lucile Packard in Micronesia where the Foundation or MPAs. The meeting itself was tan- Foundation. Since 1998, the Foun- has supported the most work: gible evidence of a steadily maturing dation has spent more than $100 Palau and the Federated States of conservation movement in a region million in eight countries—Indonesia, Micronesia, or FSM. The occasion where none really existed in 2000. the Philippines, Malaysia, the of the journey was bittersweet for “It was moving,” Cordes says. “You Federated States of Micronesia, Palau, local conservationists. The Packard had a local donor talking to orga- Solomon Islands, Fiji, and Papua Foundation is now ending its work in nizations from Palau all the way to New Guinea (PNG). That’s one of the the Western Pacific and refocusing its Marshall Islands. That didn’t happen largest and most consistent sources marine conservation efforts on the eight years ago, let alone twenty of marine conservation funding in six nations with the biggest impact years ago.” From a few individuals, the region. Micronesia’s conserva- on global ocean resources. Yet there the movement has grown to en- tion movement offers lessons for was progress to celebrate in both compass local groups, advocates, protecting wild places far beyond its FSM and Palau, which in separate government officials, and a regional, sandy shores. ways have each played a leadership reliable funding source. Conserva- role for conservation in Micronesia. tion, says Willy Kostka, MCT’s But conservationists there are For its part, Palau has made environ- executive director, “has become a certainly facing big challenges of mental stewardship a selling point sustainable movement in Micronesia their own. Overfishing, pollution, and for tourism, highlighting the aquatic and there’s no stopping.” coastal development have already life off its shores and in its won- harmed their reefs, and each stressor drous Jellyfish Lake. The country has A handful of small countries in a is intensifying. Climate change, designated MPAs over a third of its remote corner of the Pacific Ocean meanwhile, is steadily warming coastal area and established ground- came to embrace modern conserva- and acidifying the waters that are breaking fishing regulations on a key tion, adapt it to their own traditions, so central to Micronesian societies. set of reefs. FSM, meanwhile, has and make it their own. That’s surely Damage to the ecosystem is “going significantly expanded its own MPA the story of local leaders, like Kostka, slower than what you would see network and recently created new who were dedicated to the cause in other regions because of all the protections on offshore fishing in the long before their compatriots or [conservation] efforts,” says Kostka. expansive zone of ocean it controls. governments embraced it. But also But now that the movement has central to the progress in Microne- matured, it’s facing daunting chal- sia has been Western philanthropy, lenges. “In the next ten, fifteen years which fueled the change. When we really need to double, quadruple Cordes returned to the region in our efforts in order to change and to 2017—accompanied by colleagues stop this decline.” APRIL 2019 2 Reviving a traditional accustomed to fishing wherever and In 1994, an ambitious Palauan whenever they wanted,” wrote the government official named Noah conservation ethic authors of Nature’s Fortune in 2013. Idechong persuaded chiefs in the newly independent country to Growing up in Pohnpei in the 1950s, So Paul took matters into his own proclaim a traditional bul, or closure, fisher Dakio Paul loved fishing off hands. He personally declared on spawning areas, and then led an island his family owned called Kehpara closed to fishing, and began the effort to pass Palau’s first envi- Kehpara, also known as Black Coral patrolling its waters himself with a ronmental law. It regulated certain Island. Teeming with turtles, seabirds, 15-horsepower engine, a bottle of fishing and banned export of some and other marine life, the island had bourbon, a flashlight, and a shotgun. of the country’s most threatened been shown in surveys to host as He fired on at least one occasion: species. His goal at the time, he says, many as 20,000 grouper, a key a warning shot when a fisher didn’t was to “reinvigorate the traditional tropical species, in annual giant heed his call to leave. But most did, conservation ethic.” Efforts by swarms of spawning fish on a nearby and the fishing respite allowed the Micronesians like Idechong helped reef. Historically, local chiefs banned reef to recover. “After nearly three put this small island nation on the fishing during such periods so as to years of constant vigilance, local global environmental map. protect the populations’ numbers. fishermen began to notice a differ- This was the traditional way to man- ence—fish population and sizes Among the international environ- age fishing, and to punish violators. increased not only in the protected mental groups paying attention to But around 1970, Paul left Pohnpei area but also in adjacent areas, a Micronesia during the 1990s was The and moved to Saipan. spill-over effect,” noted the Conser- Nature Conservancy, or TNC, which vation Society of Pohnpei. “Aston- was in the process of establishing FSM had changed rapidly while he ished fishermen [were] converted by branch offices in FSM and, later, was gone. Islands in the region saw their own observations.” In 1999, the Palau. By the late nineties, state and increases in population, large national authorities in Palau influxes of U.S. aid, shifts to had established ten mod- a cash economy, and more estly sized protected areas motorboats, fishing tools, Paul patrolled its waters with a bottle along Palau’s coastlines and new technologies. Fish- of bourbon, a flashlight, and a shotgun. and one large protected ing was becoming a more area in the Rock Islands. individual activity, and ties to He fired on at least one occasion. TNC worked with Idechong customs that protected reefs Pohnpei legislature declared Black to create the Palau Conservation weakened. “Motor engines on speed Coral Island and eight other marine Society (PCS). “Noah and the other boats allow a so-so fisherman to sites off-limits to fishing and founders had a vision,” says Charlene become a master fisherman,” says dispatched periodic patrols. Mersai, who worked with Idechong Umai Basilius with the Palau Con- early on at PCS. “It took TNC and servation Society. GPS and sonar Individuals like Dakio Paul, who Packard to make it happen.” fish finders have only enhanced the passed away in 2008, catalyzed the trend. In the 1980s, foreign fishing birth of modern conservation in In 1996, the Packard Foundation vessels, mostly from much larger Micronesia. FSM and Palau only made a modest grant to help start Asian countries, harvested Microne- gained independence in 1986 and PCS. That was the same year that sian reef fish, increasing the pressure 1994, respectively, and like many Hewlett-Packard co-founder on marine ecosystems. developing nations, it’s proven David Packard passed away. On difficult for them to protect natural his death, several billion dollars in In 1995, after two decades living resources that are in high demand stock was transferred to the Founda- abroad, Paul returned to Pohnpei from global fisheries and tourism tion, a transfer that coincided with a and was dismayed to find a very industries. The nascent Palauan skyrocketing boom in tech-related different Kehpara. Overfishing had government’s priorities “were really stock prices. Micronesia’s incredible decimated the grouper population, building infrastructure and capacity biological diversity, combined with and boats had damaged nearby for education [and] health,” says Ann nascent conservation efforts there, reefs. Complaining to the govern- Singeo, who heads a Palauan con- suggested fertile ground for invest- ment was no use—in his absence servation and development group ment to the Foundation’s board, the government itself had become called the Ebiil Society.