Saturday 21 December 2024 | Written by Te Ipukarea Society | Published in Opinion
While coconut trees are thought to be native to the Pacific, their numbers increased greatly when coconut plantations were started during colonial times to produce copra (dried coconut). When the demand for copra dropped about 40 years ago, many Pacific islands were left with huge areas covered only by coconut trees.
Because these plantations are no longer being managed, new coconut trees grow unchecked from the dropped nuts, crowding out other native trees. This is especially true on atolls, where coconuts grow much faster than most other local coastal trees.
Growing only one type of plant in an area is termed a monoculture, and is usually bad for the environment. A variety of tree species creates a healthier ecosystem. This has long been identified as a major concern in South and Southeast Asia, where diverse rainforests are being cut down to plant a monoculture of palm trees for palm oil.
This same concern has, until recently, not been identified as an issue in the Pacific Islands. However, a recent article in Environmental Research Letters points out that this has been a problem for Pacific atolls for generations because of the copra plantations.
The article says that coconut trees now make up over half of all the tree cover on these small islands. Native broadleaf trees, which were once common, now only grow in much smaller areas. Coconut trees cover 58.3 per cent of the forested area and 24.1 per cent of the total land area of the mapped atolls. This has hurt native bird populations that nest in the broadleaf trees.
In the Cook Islands, Te Ipukarea Society has so far led or helped with rat removal projects on two atolls, Suwarrow and Palmerston, and the sand cay of Takutea. Rats are known to have a significant environmental impact on Pacific Islands, as they eat the young shoots of native plants trying to grow. They may also have an impact on seabird breeding cycles, particularly for ground nesting species.
The removal of rats from these islands could be the first step in restoring them to how they were before the copra plantations. The removal of coconut trees from uninhabited islands and replacing them with native trees would be a logical next step. Coconut trees would remain on inhabited islands or places people visit, but they would be thinned out so they don’t crowd out other native coastal trees.
One of the authors of the Environmental Research Letters article, Alex Wegmann, said that as the world deals with the problems of turning forests into farmland, we shouldn’t forget about atoll forests. He said that restoring and protecting atoll ecosystems should be a priority for ocean health because they play an important role in the ocean’s health.
Our Cook Islands atolls certainly have more than enough coconut trees. Maybe it is time to consider removing these from some motus and restoring the ecosystems to a more balanced and natural state, encouraging more seabirds to nest, adding essential nutrients to coral reefs, helping them to return to a healthier and more productive condition.
Comments