Location, topography and climate

Solomon Islands

The Solomon Islands is a predominantly island nation with over 1000 archipelagos lying within 12 degrees latitude in the southern hemisphere. The Solomon Islands has an equatorial tropical climate meaning it is usually hot and humid throughout the year, with a mean temperature of 27 degrees Celsius (Tomahawk, n.d).

The case study communities are located in the Malaita Province, which is described below.

Figure 3-1 Location of Malaita Province in the Solomon Islands.

The Solomon Islands’ extensive archipelago has two seasons. The wet season (rainy with periodic cyclones) brought by the westerly winds usually occurs from November to April, and the dry season occurs from May to October.

Malaita

Malaita covers a land area of 4,225 square kilometres, which includes mainland Malaita and

adjacent islands of South Malaita (or Maramasike), Kwai and Ngosila, Manaoba, Basakana and the far-flung atoll islands of Ndai, Sikaiana and Ontong Java. Malaita is described as a thin island, about 164 km long and 37 km wide at its widest, with mountainous topography, lowland tropical forests and shallow lagoons on the coast. With a population of 137,596 people, Malaita has the highest

Lau Lagoon

Figure 3-2 The Lau Lagoon, Malaita, and the location of the three case study communities (Funa’afou, Fumato’o and Tauba).

The Lau Lagoon and adjacent area are located in the Malaita Province of Solomon Islands, with the depth of the lagoon rarely exceeding 40 meters and shallower areas usually less than 20 meters deep. The lagoon is fringed by mangroves on the mainland side and has extensive intertidal and subtidal zones which are covered with seagrass meadows. The mid region of the lagoon has coarse sand and shell sediments and is mostly covered by coral reefs. The lagoon area possibly has the largest seagrass meadows in the Solomon Islands (Mckenzie, 2006). The lagoon is found far from the open sea and is sheltered by a vast reef area and the big island of Manaoba and contains numerous sea-based communities inhabiting artificial islands located near to channels and shallow coral reefs. The big island of Manaoba is also within the lagoon and is also protected by the reefs. The current appears to be not very strong in the lagoon. It is sometimes referred to as the “North” because of the region’s geographic location on Malaita’s northern end. The lagoon is 35 kilometres long and lies behind a barrier reef which contains about 50 artificial islands (Akimichi, 1991; Molea, 2008) and the island of Manaoba. The artificial islands range in size from the size of a football field to 20 meters long by 20 meters wide. The Lau Lagoon is otherwise only accessible by sea.

islands. Some suggest that migration occurred primarily because of tribal fighting, headhunting and cannibalism. Others suggest the early settlers migrated there because of family feuds and

contentious rivalry among tribes. It was later claimed that people settled on these artificial islands because they wanted to stay in a place that is free of mosquitoes to avoid being infected with mosquito borne diseases such as Malaria (Molea, 2008). Another wave of movement occurred in the 1900s where artificial island settlers migrated back to mainland Malaita and existing naturally formed islands in the Lagoon. The artificial islands are believed to be eroding slowly due to sea level rise. The inhabitants of the Lau Lagoon are often referred to as saltwater people (wane i asi) because of their close association with the marine environment, distinguished from the bush people (wane i tolo) who occupy the mainland of Malaita and depend on subsistence agriculture for their

livelihoods. The wane i asi people use wooden canoes, which they normally purchase from the wane i tolo people, and recently fiberglass boats and outboard motor engines, manufactured in urban centres, are used for traveling to and from the islands.

Artificial islands of the Lau Lagoon

These are man-made (artificial) islands built on shallow water near the shoreline and mangrove areas, which can be exposed during low tide, and are protected by a natural system of barrier reefs. The first few artificial islands of the Lau Lagoon were built some 300 to 400 years ago (Molea, 2008). Studies by Akimichi (Akimichi, 1991) and Molea (Molea, 2008) have shown that the artificial islands in the Lau Lagoon were built largely by either piling reef stones or hard corals into mounts on the shallow reef flats or onto a pre-existing base naturally formed from submerged coral knobs that have been on the reef prior to the arrival of early settlers. Early settlers made the islands by enclosing the intertidal knobs and reefs with stones, mostly boulder corals, collected from the reefs at low tide and along the shorelines. When the enclosure reached a height of one to two meters above the highest tide mark, earth was used to fill it and it was topped with small sized corals, rubble and sand on the surface (Molea, 2008).

Figure 3-3 A smaller artificial island (part of the community of Tauba) in the Lau Lagoon. These small islands offer limited space for the islander’s daily life. The barrier reef supports an extensive diversity of coastal marine resources which provide the economic basis of the Lau region.

Figure 3-4 Niuleni (part of the Funa’afou community), a larger artificial island in the Lau Lagoon, is built the same way as the small island in Figure 3.3.

In document Assessing the value of approaches for Community Based Marine Resource Management (CBMRM) in Solomon Islands (Page 39-43)