title: Implications of Climate Change for the Livelihoods of Urban Dwellers in Kiribati

authors: Corcoran, John

subjects: Climate change

abstract: As a result of climate change, coastal erosion, sea water intrusion into the fresh water lenses, destruction of trees that are important sources of food, medicines and building materials, and the destruction of settlements due to higher king tides and storm surges, accompanying higher mean sea levels, are threatening the sustainable survival of human societies on the atoll islands of Kiribati. Climate change is also having detrimental effects on important cultural heritage including customary practices, traditional knowledge and native languages.  The people have continued to live with the physical changes to the landscape, vegetation and water supply, despite significant deterioration in the quality of the water, and the loss of important traditional plants and trees that are used for ornamental, constructional, and medicinal purposes. 
The Kiribati government, along with governments of other countries comprising low-lying atolls and reef islands, has placed considerable emphasis on strategies to manage problems caused by climate change, especially the prospect of higher sea levels. Population and urban development pressures have further compounded existing problems associated with climate change. Land shortage and increasing population on South Tarawa have made the climate change issue more critical. This thesis examines the contemporary environmental issues linked with climate change and its impacts on the livelihoods of urban dwellers of Kiribati. 
The focus is on the country’s two main urban areas: South Tarawa in the Gilbert group and Kiritimati in the Line group. The study assesses the dependence of urban dwellers on their urban environment as well as examining their increasing vulnerability to climate change. The study concludes that there is a need for further consultation and discussion between the government of Kiribati, non-government organizations, private institutions, church institutions and the local people, as well as with interested overseas development partners and major financial donors, to plan strategies not only to provide for better living conditions for the current population but, more importantly, to ensure the islands are able to sustainably support the existence of the people now and in years to come.

text: Implications of Climate Change for the Livelihoods of Urban Dwellers in Kiribati As a result of climate change, coastal erosion, sea water intrusion into the fresh water lenses, destruction of trees that are important sources of food, medicines and building materials, and the destruction of settlements due to higher king tides and storm surges, accompanying higher mean sea levels, are threatening the sustainable survival of human societies on the atoll islands of Kiribati. Climate change is also having detrimental effects on important cultural heritage including customary practices, traditional knowledge and native languages.  The people have continued to live with the physical changes to the landscape, vegetation and water supply, despite significant deterioration in the quality of the water, and the loss of important traditional plants and trees that are used for ornamental, constructional, and medicinal purposes. 
The Kiribati government, along with governments of other countries comprising low-lying atolls and reef islands, has placed considerable emphasis on strategies to manage problems caused by climate change, especially the prospect of higher sea levels. Population and urban development pressures have further compounded existing problems associated with climate change. Land shortage and increasing population on South Tarawa have made the climate change issue more critical. This thesis examines the contemporary environmental issues linked with climate change and its impacts on the livelihoods of urban dwellers of Kiribati. 
The focus is on the country’s two main urban areas: South Tarawa in the Gilbert group and Kiritimati in the Line group. The study assesses the dependence of urban dwellers on their urban environment as well as examining their increasing vulnerability to climate change. The study concludes that there is a need for further consultation and discussion between the government of Kiribati, non-government organizations, private institutions, church institutions and the local people, as well as with interested overseas development partners and major financial donors, to plan strategies not only to provide for better living conditions for the current population but, more importantly, to ensure the islands are able to sustainably support the existence of the people now and in years to come.

year: 2016

title: Petrogenesis of Pliocene limestones in southern Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand: a contribution to unravelling the sequence stratigraphy and diagenetic pathways of cool-water shelf carbonate facies

authors: Caron, Vincent

abstract: Among carbonate sedimentologists, it is now appreciated that shallow-marine carbonates are not restricted to warm-water tropical settings, but can also be produced on modern cool-water shelves outside tropical latitudes. In the last two decades, many publications have not only advanced our knowledge about modern non-tropical carbonates, but have documented ancient skeletal limestones that are fossil analogues of these modern deposits. While the broad environmental and sedimentary characteristics of non-tropical deposits are becoming well established, the nature, timing, and relative importance of the various diagenetic processes affecting their evolution into limestones are yet to be fully appreciated, a topic addressed in the present study.

In New Zealand, the Plio-Pleistocene (5-1.5 Ma) Te Aute limestones in southern Hawke’s Bay (eastern North Island) are non-tropical in origin, and formed in shoal areas about the margins of a forearc basin seaway adjacent to the convergent Pacific-Australian Plate boundary. Because of the dynamic tectonic setting, which led to narrowing and shallowing of the host basin over time, the studied carbonates exhibit a variety of sedimentary facies (i.e., from pure coquina to mixed carbonate-siliciclastic) and mineralogical signatures (i.e., calcite- to, more rarely, aragonite-dominated), and have undergone varying degrees of burial before being uplifted to their present position. As such, the Te Aute deposits provide a unique opportunity to: (1) decipher the suite of processes that have altered their texture and composition through time; (2) address the questions of what likely regional and more global parameters, namely tectonics and eustasy, may have driven diagenetic pathways, and how this occurred; and (3) more generally advance fundamental knowledge about models of porosity evolution in non-tropical carbonates.

The present study integrates the combined results of detailed field investigations with a variety of analytical techniques, including standard, stained, and cathodoluminescence (CL) microscopic examinations of rock thin-sections, X-ray diffraction (XRD), and elemental (ICP-OES and microprobe) and stable isotope (δ¹⁸O and δ¹³C) geochemistry.

Sedimentologic analysis has identified 14 different facies types that correspond to a spectrum of depositional settings associated with both continent-attached shelves and isolated upthrust-cored antiforms within the forearc seaway. Facies are representative of environments ranging from below storm-wave base, in outer shelf-type locations, to predominantly shallow-water shoreface-type conditions under the influence of strong tidal current flows and storm waves.

A new petrographic approach for studying cool-water carbonate diagenesis has been developed. The method entails recording the high-resolution chronological occurrence of all diagenetic features within samples, and noting their vertical and lateral distribution within sedimentary formations. It is demonstrated that the attributes of pre-compaction diagenetic suites between consecutive sedimentary discontinuities change vertically in relation to the stacking of depositional facies. This original approach, by also revealing marine-cemented condensed horizons and key surfaces otherwise unrecognized in the field, has helped unlock the cryptic sedimentary architecture within the limestones. Thus, the Te Aute deposits appear to be constructed of metre-scale (1-15m) sequences that could be integrated into a sequence stratigraphic scheme, emphasizing that not only the production and deposition, but also the diagenesis of these carbonate deposits, were forced by glacio-eustatically and tectonically-driven processes.

In order to better explain the probable progression of diagenetic environments that moved through Te Aute limestones, concepts that classically underpin the sequence stratigraphic analysis of sedimentary successions have been used to group cement zones, revealed under cathodoluminescent (CL) light, into diagenetic discontinuity-bounded CL sequences. In most Pliocene limestones, the procedure, in combination with geochemical data, has: (1) identified recurring and correlative motifs of pre- and post-compaction CL sequence stratigraphies; (2) enabled regional mapping of CL sequences; (3) highlighted the spatial geometry and timing of emplacement of cementing aquifers; and (4) led to the construction of paleohydrologic models, invoking location of recharge areas and fluid-flow directions. Pre-compaction CL sequences formed locally from marine and more widely from oxidized meteoric (or mixed marine-meteoric) waters after exposure of limestone caps due to relative drops in sea level. Post-compaction burial CL sequences precipitated from reduced fluids recharged from areas of basin margin exposure, while the next CL sequences in the chronological suite are related to the ingress of oxidized meteoric waters as a result of uplift.

text: Petrogenesis of Pliocene limestones in southern Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand: a contribution to unravelling the sequence stratigraphy and diagenetic pathways of cool-water shelf carbonate facies Among carbonate sedimentologists, it is now appreciated that shallow-marine carbonates are not restricted to warm-water tropical settings, but can also be produced on modern cool-water shelves outside tropical latitudes. In the last two decades, many publications have not only advanced our knowledge about modern non-tropical carbonates, but have documented ancient skeletal limestones that are fossil analogues of these modern deposits. While the broad environmental and sedimentary characteristics of non-tropical deposits are becoming well established, the nature, timing, and relative importance of the various diagenetic processes affecting their evolution into limestones are yet to be fully appreciated, a topic addressed in the present study.

In New Zealand, the Plio-Pleistocene (5-1.5 Ma) Te Aute limestones in southern Hawke’s Bay (eastern North Island) are non-tropical in origin, and formed in shoal areas about the margins of a forearc basin seaway adjacent to the convergent Pacific-Australian Plate boundary. Because of the dynamic tectonic setting, which led to narrowing and shallowing of the host basin over time, the studied carbonates exhibit a variety of sedimentary facies (i.e., from pure coquina to mixed carbonate-siliciclastic) and mineralogical signatures (i.e., calcite- to, more rarely, aragonite-dominated), and have undergone varying degrees of burial before being uplifted to their present position. As such, the Te Aute deposits provide a unique opportunity to: (1) decipher the suite of processes that have altered their texture and composition through time; (2) address the questions of what likely regional and more global parameters, namely tectonics and eustasy, may have driven diagenetic pathways, and how this occurred; and (3) more generally advance fundamental knowledge about models of porosity evolution in non-tropical carbonates.

The present study integrates the combined results of detailed field investigations with a variety of analytical techniques, including standard, stained, and cathodoluminescence (CL) microscopic examinations of rock thin-sections, X-ray diffraction (XRD), and elemental (ICP-OES and microprobe) and stable isotope (δ¹⁸O and δ¹³C) geochemistry.

Sedimentologic analysis has identified 14 different facies types that correspond to a spectrum of depositional settings associated with both continent-attached shelves and isolated upthrust-cored antiforms within the forearc seaway. Facies are representative of environments ranging from below storm-wave base, in outer shelf-type locations, to predominantly shallow-water shoreface-type conditions under the influence of strong tidal current flows and storm waves.

A new petrographic approach for studying cool-water carbonate diagenesis has been developed. The method entails recording the high-resolution chronological occurrence of all diagenetic features within samples, and noting their vertical and lateral distribution within sedimentary formations. It is demonstrated that the attributes of pre-compaction diagenetic suites between consecutive sedimentary discontinuities change vertically in relation to the stacking of depositional facies. This original approach, by also revealing marine-cemented condensed horizons and key surfaces otherwise unrecognized in the field, has helped unlock the cryptic sedimentary architecture within the limestones. Thus, the Te Aute deposits appear to be constructed of metre-scale (1-15m) sequences that could be integrated into a sequence stratigraphic scheme, emphasizing that not only the production and deposition, but also the diagenesis of these carbonate deposits, were forced by glacio-eustatically and tectonically-driven processes.

In order to better explain the probable progression of diagenetic environments that moved through Te Aute limestones, concepts that classically underpin the sequence stratigraphic analysis of sedimentary successions have been used to group cement zones, revealed under cathodoluminescent (CL) light, into diagenetic discontinuity-bounded CL sequences. In most Pliocene limestones, the procedure, in combination with geochemical data, has: (1) identified recurring and correlative motifs of pre- and post-compaction CL sequence stratigraphies; (2) enabled regional mapping of CL sequences; (3) highlighted the spatial geometry and timing of emplacement of cementing aquifers; and (4) led to the construction of paleohydrologic models, invoking location of recharge areas and fluid-flow directions. Pre-compaction CL sequences formed locally from marine and more widely from oxidized meteoric (or mixed marine-meteoric) waters after exposure of limestone caps due to relative drops in sea level. Post-compaction burial CL sequences precipitated from reduced fluids recharged from areas of basin margin exposure, while the next CL sequences in the chronological suite are related to the ingress of oxidized meteoric waters as a result of uplift.

year: 2002

title: How Pākehā in not-for-profit organisations implement Te Tiriti o Waitangi

authors: Newcombe, Nicolina Isabel

subjects: Decolonisation

abstract: The aims of this research are to understand what is happening in not-for-profit organisations in relation to our obligation to honour Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and to describe some strategies Pākehā can use to implement Te Tiriti o Waitangi in our work in the not-for-profit sector.  

The history of, and current circumstances affecting, the not-for-profit sector have formed a disabling context, diverting energy away from deepening relationships with local hapū (subtribe). Compounding this situation, the core texts about Te Tiriti and not-for-profit organisations are inconsistent and mainly focus on the first steps of the journey: Treaty education and self assessment.  

After writing about my own experiences with Te Tiriti and working in the not-for-profit sector and comparing my stories with the stories of other Pākehā, I recorded and transcribed conversations with six anonymous Pākehā not-for-profit workers and analysed our commonalities. All participants and their organisations wanted to enact best practice, although 
this aspiration was challenged by many factors, including: a spectrum of understandings about Te Tiriti which often led to piecemeal attempts at power sharing; concerns about the effectiveness of self-assessment by Pākehā about our own Treaty work because of inevitable and inbuilt biases; experience of minimisation or exclusion for speaking up about Te Tiriti at work; box ticking Treaty policies; Māori employees being treated differently to other staff; and confusion between cultural expression and genuine power sharing.  

Protective factors that came through in interviews included: cultural practices that were woven through organisations in a way that was beneficial and welcoming to Māori; relationships with kaumātua (elders); appropriate and emotionally engaging Treaty education; Māori governance members, Māori led research in the community, and Māori involvement in all projects; te reo (Māori language) being a commonly used language in the work place; acknowledgment of our own privilege as Pākehā; and engagement in continuous dialogue about racism. 

Reflections on these issues led to recommendations for how to move forward with implementing Te Tiriti in not-for-profit organisations. These recommendations hinge on a set of actions underpinned by a set of values. Three change management strategies are also described to assist organisations with this transformation. 

This research is intended to be a building block towards empowering Pākehā allies to identify practices, policies, and power structures that could be developed to transform our organisations, and embody our obligations to Te Tiriti, leading to more effective outcomes for all New Zealanders.

text: How Pākehā in not-for-profit organisations implement Te Tiriti o Waitangi The aims of this research are to understand what is happening in not-for-profit organisations in relation to our obligation to honour Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and to describe some strategies Pākehā can use to implement Te Tiriti o Waitangi in our work in the not-for-profit sector.  

The history of, and current circumstances affecting, the not-for-profit sector have formed a disabling context, diverting energy away from deepening relationships with local hapū (subtribe). Compounding this situation, the core texts about Te Tiriti and not-for-profit organisations are inconsistent and mainly focus on the first steps of the journey: Treaty education and self assessment.  

After writing about my own experiences with Te Tiriti and working in the not-for-profit sector and comparing my stories with the stories of other Pākehā, I recorded and transcribed conversations with six anonymous Pākehā not-for-profit workers and analysed our commonalities. All participants and their organisations wanted to enact best practice, although 
this aspiration was challenged by many factors, including: a spectrum of understandings about Te Tiriti which often led to piecemeal attempts at power sharing; concerns about the effectiveness of self-assessment by Pākehā about our own Treaty work because of inevitable and inbuilt biases; experience of minimisation or exclusion for speaking up about Te Tiriti at work; box ticking Treaty policies; Māori employees being treated differently to other staff; and confusion between cultural expression and genuine power sharing.  

Protective factors that came through in interviews included: cultural practices that were woven through organisations in a way that was beneficial and welcoming to Māori; relationships with kaumātua (elders); appropriate and emotionally engaging Treaty education; Māori governance members, Māori led research in the community, and Māori involvement in all projects; te reo (Māori language) being a commonly used language in the work place; acknowledgment of our own privilege as Pākehā; and engagement in continuous dialogue about racism. 

Reflections on these issues led to recommendations for how to move forward with implementing Te Tiriti in not-for-profit organisations. These recommendations hinge on a set of actions underpinned by a set of values. Three change management strategies are also described to assist organisations with this transformation. 

This research is intended to be a building block towards empowering Pākehā allies to identify practices, policies, and power structures that could be developed to transform our organisations, and embody our obligations to Te Tiriti, leading to more effective outcomes for all New Zealanders.

year: 2019