PINA

By Ofani Eremae At the Korona logging camp on San Jorge Island in the Solomon Islands’ Isabel province, the logging machinery lay quiet. Except for the movement of three local security guards, the silence at this once-bustling log pond was deafening. “The workers have gone home,” Eric Gnokro, a chief in the area who negotiated my entry into this tightly...

Term one of the school year has been cut short, and a four-week holiday begins on Monday, as the Papua New Guinea Government implements a plan to arrest the current surge in Covid-19 cases. National Pandemic Response Controller David Manning said the total Covid-19 cases as of noon Tuesday was 2,479, including 31 deaths. There were 128 new cases reported in...

Papua New Guinea could have received Covid-19 vaccines before its current crisis if Australia had not been part of a group of countries that blocked a proposal to free up access to Covid-19 medicines, say Médecins Sans Frontières Australia. “There’s no doubt the intellectual property waiver had been hastened and scaled at an earlier time there was a higher...

Europe has threatened to seize AstraZeneca factories and strip the pharmaceutical giant of its intellectual property rights in a fresh escalation of the bitter row over coronavirus vaccine exports. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen refused to rule out the dramatic interventions on Wednesday, warning “all options are on the table” to boost the number of doses available to...

Following a recent public consultation in the northern group and an internal policy review, the Cook Islands Opposition Democratic Party has come out against a ten-year moratorium on seabed mining. The new policy aligns the Demos with Government but puts the party at odds with environmental groups such as Te Ipukarea Society, global NGO’s, and Pacific nations such as Fiji...

One of Papua New Guinea's leading doctors says Australia's promise to share COVID-19 vaccine doses is of vital importance. “We desperately need the vaccine because our health workers are being infected at an alarming rate,” Glen Mola told 7.30. In hotel quarantine in Cairns, the 74-year-old obstetrician is hoping to get vaccinated in Australia before returning to work in Port Moresby....

Fiji is at the forefront of global efforts to strengthen disaster and climate resilience by pursuing resilient infrastructure development. This message was conveyed at the virtual International Conference on Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (ICDRI 2021), an annual international conference of the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) held from 17 - 19 March 2021. ICDRI 2021 was inaugurated Wednesday by the Prime...

The Janssen COVID-19 vaccine was publicly approved for international use on Wednesday by UN health agency expert advisory board, SAGE, which allayed concerns over clotting events being associated by some countries, without definitive evidence, with coronavirus jabs. In a virtual press conference from Geneva, SAGE hailed the one-dose Janssen shot – produced by a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary - as...

The people of Banaba in Kiribati have received the much-needed fresh water supplies from the capital Tarawa on Sunday – after a year without clean water. Reports reaching PACNEWS confirmed the Kiribati government-chartered vessel, LC Linnix arrived on the island with fresh water supplies, a desalination plant and materials to repair damaged water tanks on the island. The Kiribati government...

Pacific Women basketball leaders are leading the way in the growth of basketball in the region with fresh perspectives and innovative approaches to developing the game. According to a Russell 1000 report, in 2018, female leaders held 20.8 percent of the board seats listed on corporate boards. With a review of the current board members of National Federations in the Oceania...