Neu: 2001-11-13 Contents of this issue:
1. Surprise Forecast 2. Arts Assistance 3. Trade Appointment ======================================================================== November 13th, 2001 1. Surprise Forecast: New figures compiled from detailed Pacific islands weather records show that over the past 50 years many parts of the Pacific warmed much faster than the global average. Pacific island meteorologists in Auckland at a National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research/Asia-Pacific Network for Global Change Research workshop compiled all their national measurements. They produced regional picture of climate from 1950 to 2000. Workshop convenor Dr Jim Salinger said this amount of detail had not been available before. The resulting picture of the Pacific's climate over the second half of the 20th century surprised scientists at the workshop. Dr Salinger said it became immediately plain that there has been an unusually strong warming in the South Pacific. "For the whole of the last century, the global average temperature rise was 0.6 degrees Celsius," Dr Salinger said. "But in the Pacific, temperatures rose higher than that in the second half of the century alone." The daily temperature records show that in Australia, Cook Islands, Fiji, French Polynesia, New Caledonia, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu, temperatures rose by half to one degree Celsius in the second half of the 20th century. Elsewhere in the Pacific, the warming was similar to the global average warming. "This shows that global warming is alive and well," Dr Salinger said. He said the higher than expected temperature rises would have been accentuated by the greater number of El Niņos which developed in the last quarter of the 20th century. These were between 1976 and 1998. The regional view of Pacific island weather data also revealed a significant reduction in rainfall in many parts of the Pacific. "While this was not as widespread as the unusual warming, it is also evidence of long-term changes in climate," Dr Salinger said. ( PINA Nius Online). 2. Arts Assistance: >From hip-hop artists to jewellery-makers, Pacific artists of many persuasions will be recipients of financial assistance after the latest round of grants from the Pacific Arts Committee of Creative New Zealand. Genevieve Jackson of Mangere will get $2000 to present a live show and promote Niuean music. And from support for small-scale local exhibitions and research projects to assistance for overseas exhibitions, the committee has acknowledged the diversity of Pacific arts and their potential for reaching into the wider world. Grants totalling $137,690 have been given to 26 projects (out of a record 58 applications), among them $5000 to the Christchurch all-woman hip-hop outfit Sheelahroc to take part in next year's Adelaide Arts Festival and $4000 to Pacifica Dunedin Central to hold three weekend-long workshops conducted by Maori and Pacific Island master weavers to create works for an exhibition. The Sydney art gallery Pacific-Artspace has been offered $5000 to support an exhibition at the Sydney College of the Arts (artists include John Ioane, Lily Aitui Laita and Niki Hastings-McFall), and Auckland jeweller and body adornment artist Sofia Tekela-Smith has been given $6000 to help her solo showing at Sydney's Mori Gallery this month. Among the development grants are $6000 to Nightmare of Wellington to adapt Oscar Kightley's play Dawn Raid into a film script, $13,000 to VAhine of Whangaparaoa to research and develop new works based on star mounds and oral traditions in Western Samoa, and $6000 to the Waikato Museum of Art and History for an exhibition Dolly Mix (w)rapper opening in March, which will celebrate Samoan women artists, including photographers, painters and those working in installation/adornment. Individuals receiving grants include Lisa Taouma of Auckland who gets $2700 to attend a symposium in New York next February, where she will present a paper and selections of her documentary work on Pacific art and images, Graham Fletcher of Auckland ($4000, towards publication costs of a catalogue to accompany his exhibition at Christchurch's Brooke Gifford Gallery), Misa Tupou of Hawaii ($6000 to present her two-person play Ola's Son at next year's Wellington Fringe Festival), and Makerita Urale of Wellington ($7000 to tour the multi-lingual fairytale Popo the Fairy in Samoa). The committee also acknowledged festival showcases of Pacific arts with a grant of $5000 to the 2002 Smokefree Pacifica Beats award to encourage contemporary Pacific music and performance in the annual cokesmokefreerockquest, the Pacific Islands Community Committee of Hastings ($5000 to celebrate and showcase Pacific arts over the summer of 2001-02), the Wellington Fringe Festival Trust ($10,000 to promote and present the newly inaugurated Pacific Island arts section of the fringe), and the Public Dreams Trust of Hastings ($5000 to produce a Te Vaka performance at their community event on December 30-31). In other awards, the band Ardijah of Manukau City have been awarded $5000 to create work fusing elements of Pacific and Maori music with their contemporary soul-funk style and Erupi Gaualofa of Taupo receives $2000 to run a workshop on Tokelau carving. 3. Trade Appointment: Cook Islander Rohan Ellis has been appointed trade representative for the newly established Pacific Islands Forum Trade Office in Beijing, People's Republic of China. Mr Ellis joins the trade office from the Cook Islands Development and Investment Board where he was the chief executive officer. He will take up his appointment in Beijing on 1 December. "The appointment of Rohan Ellis is an important step in further developing the excellent relations the Forum continues to enjoy with the Government of the People's Republic of China," said Mr Noel Levi secretary general of the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat. "The Trade Office in Beijing will work to promote stronger trade and investment links between China and our region. These activities will help to lift the profile of our private sectors, and increase the potential benefits for our respective communities. "China is a vast market which needs to be tapped into, while the Pacific Island countries cover a huge resource rich area - there will be increasing opportunities for us to share a role in our economic growth," Mr Levi said. The Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat operates similar trade offices in Sydney, Australia; Auckland, New Zealand and Tokyo, Japan. (Forum Secretariat) __END__
