Conservation International, GRID-Arendal and Geoscience Australia recently collaborated to produce a map of the global distribution of seafloor geomorphic features. The global seafloor geomorphic features map represents an important contribution towards the understanding of the distribution of blue habitats. Certain geomorphic feature are known to be good surrogates for biodiversity. For example, seamounts support a different suite of species to abyssal plains.
The UN Biodiversity Lab is an online platform that allows policymakers and other partners to access global data layers, upload and manipulate their own datasets, and query multiple datasets to provide key information on the Aichi Biodiversity Targets and nature-based Sustainable Development Goals.
Monitoring reports for Fanga'uta Lagoon, Tongatapu.
The World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA) is the most comprehensive global database of marine and terrestrial protected areas, updated on a monthly basis, and is one of the key global biodiversity data sets being widely used by scientists, businesses, governments, International secretariats and others to inform planning, policy decisions and management.
Regional data on marine pollution.
Bio-ORACLE is a set of GIS rasters providing geophysical, biotic and environmental data for surface and benthic marine realms. The data are available for global-scale applications at a spatial resolution of 5 arcmin (approximately 9.2 km at the equator).
Linking biodiversity occurrence data to the physical and biotic environment provides a framework to formulate hypotheses about the ecological processes governing spatial and temporal patterns in biodiversity, which can be useful for marine ecosystem management and conservation.
AquaMaps are computer-generated predictions of natural occurrence of marine species, based on the environmental tolerance of a given species with respect to depth, salinity, temperature, primary productivity, and its association with sea ice or coastal areas. These 'environmental envelopes' are matched against an authority file which contains respective information for the Oceans of the World. Independent knowledge such as distribution by FAO areas or bounding boxes are used to avoid mapping species in areas that contain suitable habitat, but are not occupied by the species.
A direct internet link to and resources pertaining the Blue Habitat website which has been established as a portal for information on the global distribution of marine ‘blue’ habitats. Knowledge on the distribution of blue habitats is an important input into ocean management, marine spatial planning and biodiversity conservation.
Marine pollution in the Pacific. Regional data
MACBIO is a project that supports sustainable economies and livelihoods of Pacific Island Countries by strengthening institutional and individual capacity, to manage and conserve biodiversity in marine and coastal ecosystems. The project was commissioned by BMUB to GIZ as part of IKI, jointly implemented by SPREP, IUCN and GIZ from 2013 to 2018.
This dataset holds all MACBIO-related resources pertaining to Tonga as one of the participating countries.
This dataset shows the global distribution of seamounts and knolls identified using global bathymetric data at 30 arc-sec resolution. A total of 33,452 seamounts and 138,412 knolls were identified, representing the largest global set of identified seamounts and knolls to date. Seamount habitat was found to constitute approximately 4.7% of the ocean floor, whilst knolls covered 16.3%.
The research leading to these results received funding from the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme, and from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
GEBCO's aim is to provide the most authoritative publicly-available bathymetry of the world's oceans. It operates under the joint auspices of the International Hydrographic Organization(IHO) and the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) (of UNESCO).
GEBCO produces and makes available a range of bathymetric data sets and products. This includes a global bathymetric grid; gazetteer of undersea feature names, a Web Map Service and printable maps of ocean bathymetry.
The World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA) is the most comprehensive global database of marine and terrestrial protected areas, updated on a monthly basis, and is one of the key global biodiversity data sets being widely used by scientists, businesses, governments, International secretariats and others to inform planning, policy decisions and management. The WDPA is a joint project between UN Environment and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
This CMEP report provides a summary of climate change impacts on coasts and seas in the Pacific island region, and how Pacific islands can respond.
This chapter describes the diversity and distribution of mangrove, seagrass and intertidal flat habitats in the tropical Pacific (25°N–25°S and 130°E–130°W), outlining the role they play in supporting coastal fisheries in the region, and summarising the critical requirements for establishing and maintaining these habitats.