The Ministry of Fisheries and Forest this year 2010 launch an initiative for Fiji to plant a million trees for the future. Mamanuca Environment Society (MES) over the years have been initiating projects toward environmental protection on marine lives and terrestrial’s environment within the Mamanuca remote islands. Maintaining and protecting the terrestrial’s environment on such remote island here in the Mamanucas is very vital for the islands nature and also for those wildlife’s that are endemic and native to them.
The Mamanuca Environment Society (MES) through its community engagement and school programmes have been involve in the plating of trees back into the environment. From community perspectives, they are now realizing that their islands are now filled with bare grassland as a result from continuous burning activities that are not controlled by villages. What are common are the coastal forests which are not really thick and if they don’t monitor and protect it, they will loose it too. These common sites are common throughout the Mamanucas and the Yasawas groups of islands because of their location within the dry forest / land side of Fiji.
Likuliku Lagoon Resortis is a member of the Mamanuca Environment Society, the eye of pearl among the resorts in the Mamanuca and Malolo groups of islands where the heart of tourism in Fiji lies. They have won many international awards and local award which they have contributed a lot toward environmental protection at its best toward marine and terrestrials surrounding.
Last week, MES and Likuliku Lagoon Resort launch their terrestrial’s project by planting tree into the surrounding environment to protect soil erosion and enhance the natural environment that the resort has built into. Through MES, they have ordered 300 native trees from the Department of Forestry in Colo-I-Suva to start off the programme and this was something they would embark on for the next couple of years on site.
Also as part of this programme, Mamanuca Environment Society (MES) and Likuliku Lagoon Resort have already working on a Mangrove planting programme which is also vital and important toward maintaining and protecting coastal tress and forest. These programmes are also introduced and encourage for house guests to take part in and enjoy as part of their activities at the Resorts.
As part of the MES environmental programmes in the Mamanucas, we are also working closely with our members like South Sea Island, Mana Island Resort, Castaway Island Resort, Malolo Island Resort, Wadigi Island Resort, Matamanoa, Tokoriki, Navini Island Resorts, Tavarua and Namotu Island resorts with other stakeholders to combat environmental changes in our region. The involvement of our local communities and our local school programmes is the most important aspects of all because it’s about their future and their people.
Planting a tree and having a tree to grow is very important toward the livelihoods of our people. Fiji is experiencing flash flooding very often today because we are not replanting trees back into our lands and hills. There are a lot of loggings activities everywhere and more and more of our mountains are getting bared, allowing heavy rains to falls through these mountains causing sedimentation process that would tale flash these silts down from the mountains into the sea and kills off most of our coral reefs. What ever happens on lands reflects and affects what is out there in our coral reefs and this is very important.
The Mamanuca Environment Society (MES) continuous its awareness and education programme through its target stakeholders to challenge their roles and responsibilities toward protecting their environment to sustain the future.
