To empower women in Papua New Guinea with the training, skills, equipment, and resources they need to take an active role in helping indigenous communities create and manage marine protected areas on their own coral reefs. Combining an ethos of science, gender equity, and sustainability, the Sea Women of Melanesia work with traditional landowners to develop marine reserves that enhance fisheries and biodiversity, while improving the basic quality of life of people in our partner villages through the delivery of humanitarian aid. The SWoM program supports the UN Sustainable Development Goals of Gender Equality, Sustainable Communities, and Life Below Water.
External link for Sea Women of Melanesia Inc.
Ororo Cres.
Port Moresby, National Capital District 121, PG
Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. Director Naomi Longa was honoured to be the first Papua New Guinean 🇵🇬 to experience the new National Geographic Society submarine "Argonauta" on the recent Pristine Seas expedition to the Bismarck Sea. Naomi and the Argonauta crew descended over 450m down the outer wall of Hermit Atoll!
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Snapshots of reef life from Aua Island in the western Bismarck Sea, Papua New Guinea, by National Geographic Society Pristine Seas photographer Ollie Velasco and Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. Director Naomi Longa. This expedition to this remote part of the Coral Triangle gathered vast amounts of scientific information on the biodiversity of the reefs and surrounding pelagic and deep-water ecosystems, and Naomi personally collected thousands of survey images for the Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. ReefCloud.Ai Project. This expedition highlighted the incredible conservation value of the remote western islands of Manus Province, and the Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. and Coral Sea Foundation teams look forward to returning to this region in 2025 to assist the local communities with their marine conservation aspirations. seawomen.net #seawomenofmelanesia #papuanewguinea #coral #coralreef #coraltriangle #auaatoll #biodiversity #marineconservation #marinescience #reefsurvey #pristineseasnationalgeographic
Basslets schooling on the upper reef slope at Aua Island in the western Bismarck Sea, Papua New Guinea. Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. Director Naomi Longa recently joined the National Geographic Society Pristine Seas expedition to this remote part of the Coral Triangle, diving the steep outer walls of the atoll and collecting survey imagery for our ReefCloud.Ai Project, and she captured this footage during the survey dives. This expedition highlighted the incredible conservation value of the remote western islands of Manus Province, and the Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. and Coral Sea Foundation teams look forward to returning to this region in 2025 to assist the local communities with their marine conservation aspirations. seawomen.net #seawomenofmelanesia #papuanewguinea #coral #coralreef #coraltriangle #auaatoll #biodiversity #marineconservation #marinescience #reefsurvey #pristineseasnationalgeographic See less
Great work by the PoM team!
We pride ourselves on science-based, objective reporting on reef condition in our region, regardless of whether the news is good, bad or ugly. So we are absolutely thrilled to share these survey images of the vibrant coral community at Daromia Reef, just 20km from Port Moresby, the national capitol of Papua New Guinea, collected two days ago by the awesome Sea Women of Melanesia Inc.-PNG team. These fringing reefs had exceptionally high coral cover and coral biodiversity, indicating they have not suffered any major stress events in the last 5 years or so, and this represents an incredibly important cultural, social and biological resource right on the doorstep of Port Moresby. The Sea Women team collected over 500 geotagged high-resolution images from these reefs and these have already been uploaded to our ReefCloud.Ai system for analysis, highlighting the importance of active reef monitoring by Indigenous traditional owners and the power of AI and digital technology to quickly produce detailed results that can effectively inform management. In many parts of PNG and other Pacific nations, large sums of money are being thrown at small-scale, ineffectual reef "restoration" programs, to the detriment of funding and support for community-based Locally Managed Marine Areas which sustain both fisheries and high biodiversity reefs like these. Melanesian people depend on the sea for their food and livelihoods, and they cannot eat a farmed staghorn coral fragment! We continue to advocate for and support Locally Managed Marine Protected Areas as the most effective tool for sustaining both fisheries, ecotourism, and marine biodiversity in the face of climate change. coralseafoundation.net seawomen.net The Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. work across PNG is supported by: Coral Sea Foundation Steamships Limited PNG Sall Family Foundation Whitley Fund for Nature National Geographic PRISTINE SEAS INC Kristin Lindblad and the Wanderlust Fund Jock Clough Marine Foundation Swire Shipping
Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. Team leader Naomi Longa joined the National Geographic Society PRISTINE SEAS INC expedition and visited her clan island of Harengan, on the western end of Manus, Papua New Guinea. The team found found great numbers of fish in the Locally Managed Marine Area created by Naomi in partnership with the local community in 2020 - another demonstration of the effectiveness of of the female-led Sea Women of Melanesia program and win for grassroots marine conservation in the Coral Triangle waters of PNG! https://lnkd.in/gE8hDJYG
Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. Director Naomi Longa representing PNG and Bismarck Sea traditional owners on the historic National Geographic Society Pristine Seas expedition to Manus Island and Hermit and Ninigo Atolls, some of the most important biodiversity areas in the eastern Coral Triangle. Stay tuned for updates, because the reef ecosystems they found are spectacular and globally significant for marine conservation. seawomen.net #seawomenofmelanesia #papuanewguinea #coraltriangle #coralreef #biodiversity #womeninSTEM #marinescience #marineconservation
Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. reposted this
Find out how the Seawomen of Melanesia are using our AI-driven digital tool ReefCloud to map and monitor coral reefs in Papua New Guinea. Led by Naomi Longa, the all-female team is monitoring Kimbe Bay - an area of staggering marine biodiversity. Naomi has been a key member of the ReefCloud knowledge exchange workshops and she was recognised with a Whitley Award this year from the Whitley Fund for Nature, a London-based NGO backed by Sir David Attenborough. She shares her story on the new podcast series: How to Save It. 🎧 Apple: https://lnkd.in/gw2RQ-gZ 🎧 Spotify: https://lnkd.in/gAUiV_rA #ReefCloud
New reef survey imagery was collected from Daromia Reef near the national capital Port Moresby last week by our PoM Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. team. Despite this site being close to the city and several large villages, we were pleasantly surprised by the diversity of coral species and their size at this location. This suggests that marine protected areas would be a more effective solution to preserve natural coral biodiversity here, compared to artificial reef restoration approaches which are expensive and only effective at very small scales. Real time reef monitoring data like this is essential for informing marine resource management decisions and targeting the ideal locations for Locally Managed Marine Areas, and we will be using the ReefCloud.Ai system to obtain detailed estimates of coral cover and composition from this new data. www.seawomen.net We extend our thanks to the traditional owners of these reefs from Tubusereia Village for their assistance with the survey trip, and to our program partners for the support of our marine conservation work: Coral Sea Foundation Steamships Limited PNG Sall Family Foundation Swire Pacific Shipping Jock Clough Marine Foundation Kristin Lindblad and the Wanderlust Fund
Our Milne Bay Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. team completed community engagement, training and reef survey work at Topura village on the northern side of the East Cape peninsula last month, at the request of landowners from the Yavarata Clan who were concerned about declining fish catches and the condition of their reefs. This is a new area of engagement for the Sea Women of Melanesia Inc. and the fringing reefs here are quite unique, growing on black sand bottoms and dropping into very deep water quite close to shore. Survey images have been uploaded to our ReefCloud.Ai Project space and if you would like to join our volunteer image analysis team to see the images from Topura and other locations in PNG, then please email [email protected] and we can set you up with training materials and project access. www.seawomen.net #seawomenofmelanesia #coralseafoundation #papuanewguinea #milnebay #coraltriangle #coral #coralreef #marineconservation #marinescience #reefsurvey #biodiversity #reefcloud
Join our Director Naomi Longa as she discusses her reef conservation work in the Coral Triangle waters of Papua New Guinea in this podcast with Kate Humble from Whitley Fund for Nature. https://lnkd.in/gwt5TZp2? #seawomenofmelanesia #coraltriangle #marineconservation #sharedfuture #whitleyawards