Tongan conservationist wins 2023 “Pacific Invasive Species Battler of the Year” [1]
Thursday, November 23, 2023 - 17:11. Updated on Thursday, November 23, 2023 - 21:21.
Tonga's Viliami Hakaumotu was named as the “2023 Pacific Invasive Species Battler of the Year”, at the opening of the Pacific Invasive Learning Network (PILN) Meeting, in Apia, Samoa, last week.
SPREP Invasive Species Adviser, Mr. David Moverley said Viliami was a clear winner.
“We are very lucky to have so many great people in the Pacific who are willing to step up and act in our fight against invasive species, it makes deciding who will get the award each year very difficult.
“However, in 2023 there was a clear winner, the substantial amount of work and progress that Viliami has got through over the past eleven years beginning with creating Tonga’s first National Invasive Species Strategy and Action Plan (NISSAP) and then a decade of its implementation is indeed a legacy for Tonga. We are all very proud of Viliami and what he has achieved for the people of the Kingdom.”
Viliami is the National Invasive Species Coordinator in Tonga’s Ministry of Meteorology, Energy, Information, Disaster Management, Environment, Climate Change and Communications (MEIDECC).
The groundbreaking conservation initiative led by Viliami Hakaumotu and his team, to eradicate rats on Late Island in July this year, was a decisive factor in securing this year's Battler of the Year Award.
Late Island is a vital sanctuary for biodiversity, housing one of Tonga's largest intact tropical broadleaf forest ecosystems, a critical stronghold for globally threatened species such as the Friendly Ground-dove and Tongan Whistler.
Moreover, Viliami played a key role in the Mt. Talau Restoration, from 2015 to 2023, an initiative that aimed to protect the forest on Mt Talau, which is one of the few remaining low-land tropical forests in Vava’u, and houses precious endemic species, including the endemic bird locally known as the Hengahenga (Tongan Whistler), and the Casearia buelowii plant species endemic to Mt Talau, which was identified for the first time in 2014.
SPREP reported this is the first time the Pacific Invasive Species Battler of the Year award has been awarded in person, and at the 5th PILN Meeting they celebrated not only this year’s winner, but previous recipients of the award who each received their trophies at the opening event, on Monday, 13 November.