National Stakeholders Blue Carbon Workshop Papua New Guinea
3 March, 2023 - Papua New Guinea is home to the highest number of species and total cover of mangroves and seagrasses within the Pacific Island countries. The Government of Papua New Guinea recognizes the importance of its blue carbon ecosystems for local communities and for supporting and conserving its rich biodiversity on land and at sea.
To improve the management, sustainable use and conservation of its blue carbon ecosystems, it plans to develop an enabling framework for activities and projects. To this end, the Government of Papua New Guinea through the Climate Change and Development Authority (CCDA) and in cooperation with The Nature Conservancy (TNC) hosted a National Stakeholders Blue Carbon Workshop in Port Moresby from March 1st to 3rd, 2023.
The main objectives for this meeting were to understand what kind of blue carbon activities are currently taking place in PNG, as well as the challenges, gaps and barriers that are preventing the implementation and progress of blue carbon in Papua New Guinea. Stakeholders invited from the government, provincial administrations, agencies, diplomatic corps, development partners, private sector and civil society organisations were invited to strengthen coordination, to reaffirm key action priorities and to give guidance to CCDA and the government.
The MACBLUE project partners with both the CCDA as well as the Conservation and Environmental Protection Agency (CEPA) to improve the management and conservation of the national blue carbon stocks. MACBLUE presented its project approach and validated it through discussions with government partners and stakeholders. The workshop presented a great opportunity for the project to learn from experiences on the ground, get important feedback on needs, and discuss possible entry points and priorities with involved stakeholders. It resulted in stakeholders reaffirming commitments to decide better, coordinate smartly and access resources actively in partnership toward developing a Blue Carbon Policy Framework for Papua New-Guinea.
