PINA

The Morrison Government and the Australian Olympic Committee (AOC) are working in partnership to support over 170 Olympic and Paralympic athletes from eleven Pacific nations to prepare for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games. Due to the impact of COVID-19, many Pacific athletes face significant challenges in completing final training programs and critical qualifying events. With support from the Australian...

The speaker of the Vanuatu parliament has declared the seats of the Prime Minister, the Deputy prime minister and 16 other government MPs vacant. The government had filed a motion to have the Speaker, Gracia Shadrack, removed; a feud which saw the MPs and prime minister Bob Loughman boycott Parliament for three days last week. This morning, Shadrack said their three...

Last week's launch of a film documentary, Setting the Boundaries - Voices from the Last Frontier is part of a regional series focusing on calls for a halt to deep sea mining. Reporting concerns from Fiji over deep sea mining (DSM) explorations, shared widely across the Pacific, Voices from the Last Frontier calls for a complete halt to DSM in...

Fiji Rugby will have heads turning on and off the field of play this year with the Pacific rugby powerhouse partnering with global sporting giant Nike as its official team and training kit supplier. The four-year deal will see the iconic Nike Swoosh feature on the Men’s and Women’s training and playing kits for both 15’s and 7’s national representative...

By Francisco Blaha If you were to speak about “IUU fishing” 10 or 15 years ago, only a few fish nerds would have known what you were saying. Even today, when there is much more known about it, it is still a complex concept to grasp. Illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing is a broad term that captures a wide...

Over one hundred participants from twenty-two Pacific island countries and territories met this week at the thirteenth SPC Heads of Fisheries meeting, focusing on important topics and fisheries priorities for Pacific people. Enhancing scientific knowledge and technical tools to better serve members are key priorities for the coming years. Heads of Fisheries, senior fisheries managers, field officers, fisheries officers, donors,...

Some two billion doses of COVID-19 vaccine have been distributed globally but only 0.5 per cent have reached low-income countries where frontline health workers and the elderly have yet to receive a shot, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Friday. “This week, we’ll probably pass the two billion doses - if we have not already passed it…in terms of...

Heads of Government, religious leaders, activists and artists joined the United Nations on Friday in a rallying cry to heal the planet, launching the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. It calls for stepping up efforts to prevent, halt and reverse degradation of areas such as grasslands, forests, oceans and mountains, essential to all life on Earth. With humanity facing a “triple...

A Cook Islands man who has been on holiday in Rarotonga since 21 May, 2021 has tested positive for Covid-19, after requesting to be swabbed Friday evening. The alert level remains unchanged and the risk to public remains low, government says. The man who arrived in Auckland from Egypt on 05 May, 2021, and tested positive when in managed isolation...

Fiji has recorded an alarmingly high 83 new cases on Sunday, its highest daily figure yet. Ministry of Health and Medical Services permanent secretary Dr James Fong said the majority of those cases were from known clusters or areas already under containment or lockdown protocols. Those areas include Waila, CWM Hospital, IMT-HQ, IMT Warehouse, Caubati, Navy, Samabula, Shop N Save Supermarket,...