Fisheries in the Pacific

Samuel Cornier and Isabelle Leblic
today (Leblic 1993; Sand et al. 2003; Demmer and Salomon 2015). Huge inequities
still exist between the three Provinces: the Kanak people represent the majority of
the population in North Province and the Loyalties, while they are a minority in
South Province, which hosts almost 70% of the total population 17 of the archipelago,
with more than 50% living in the main city, Noumea. Nevertheless, the majority 18
of Kanak people now live in Noumea as well (ISEE 2014).
New Caledonia hosts some of the richest marine biodiversity in the world, with
approximately over twenty thousand species, 5% of which are endemic, inhabiting what
is the longest continuous coral barrier reef of the world and the second largest after the
Great Barrier Reef of Australia (Comité local Ifrecor 2006a; Richer de Forges and
Pascal 2008). Marine scientists and environmental NGOs (such as Conservation International
and the World Wild Fund) also consider the archipelago to be a sanctuary for
many emblematic species such as whales, sea turtles, dugongs and birds. At the national
level, New Caledonia’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) represents the second largest
maritime territory after French Polynesia, with a surface area of nearly 1.4 million square
km. The archipelago alone holds 75% of the coral reefs and lagoons under French
jurisdiction (Comité local Ifrecor 2006a; Richer de Forges et Pascal 2008).
This national and international recognition, combined with contemporary
socioeconomic issues, 19 were among the reasons that six marine clusters in the
lagoons of New Caledonia, forming a serial site, were inscribed on the World
Heritage List in 2008 (see fig. 4 and Comité local Ifrecor 2006a). The total area
covers 16 million hectares, which represents almost 60% of New Caledonia’s marine
coastal territories. An innovative framework was designed for the conservation of
this area based on the concept of “integrated and participatory co-management”.
Integrated coastal zones management consists of linking these marine clusters,
which are deemed representatives of the marine biodiversity and ecosystems of the
archipelago, to several upstream terrestrial buffer zones (Cicin-Sain and Belfiore
2005). The co-management of this area relies on the participation of international
stakeholders (French MPA Agency, NGOs such as the World Wild Fund and
Conservation International, UNESCO, scientific institutions such as the Research
and Development Institute and Ifremer), the implementation of an “MPA network”, 20
and multiple institutional scales of competencies. The legislative organization of
17. The total population of New Caledonia was estimated to be 268,767 inhabitants in the last census
conducted in 2014 (ISEE 2014).
18. The same census counted 42,065 Kanak residents in Greater Noumea (Grand Nouméa in French) for
a total of 104,958 representatives of this community (ISEE 2014).
19. This project was initiated by local NGOs campaigning for sustainable development alternatives to
the mining industry (Corail Vivant, Action Biosphère) and was supported by Kanak authorities via the
customary Senate (Cornier 2009: 122-123).
20. The World Conservation Union defines an MPA network as: “a collection of individual marine protected
areas or reserves operating co-operatively and synergistically, at various spatial scales and with a range of
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